Black Moon Rising
by All That's Left is a Girl
Summary: A/U At 3 years old my families collided resulting in the death of my parents, the destruction of the one who killed them and my adoption. I never dreamed I would be brought back to where my life began, Forks WA. I never imagined there were more than just vampires that went bump in the night or that I would end up trying to straddle two worlds in direct conflict with each other.
1. Introduction

Welcome to Black Moon Rising.

This completely AU story came to me while working on my other story Under The Full Moon. I couldn't stop my muse and so Black Moon Rising was born. For those of you who have read and/or are following Under The Full Moon, I am still working on it and it is not forgotten. Installment length will most likely be shorter than Under The Full Moon but significantly longer then this one and there will be use of multiple POVs in this story (a personal first for me, let me know what you think) with two main POVs and, perhaps, two or three other characters getting a moment in the limelight at some point or another. If it gets confusing give me a shout.

The lovely SeptemberSkies has agreed kindly to beta for me so many props and much thanks to her, I appreciate her time and effort greatly.

All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc are the property of their respective owners. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any previously copyrighted material. No copyright infringement is intended.

With that said I love reviews and I love constructive criticism as I love to learn and am striving to improve my craft at every opportunity. Please, please do leave me a note when you're done reading no matter how long and let me know what you think. I am open to opinions and views especially if they are constructive after all that's how we learn and grow.

Thank you!

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Introduction

(JPOV)

All summer all I had done was run patrol. Wake up at 6am, patrol for eight hours, sleep for two, patrol for eight hours, sleep for five hour and then start again. Out of my eleven week summer break I'd spent seventy-one thousand three hundred and twenty-one minutes phased into a giant fucking werewolf running patrols around the whole god damned Olympic Peninsula. That was forty-nine days twelve hours and forty-one minutes making sure that no humans near La Push became vampire bait.

What thanks did I get? None! Humans didn't know that vampires existed or that they needed protecting from them and if vampires didn't exist then neither did werewolves. I had been doing well in school before all of this had started and I had quickly been informed by the council and by my Alpha that I would continue to be expected to keep up with my school work come fall. I wasn't the only one either.

The three youngest in the Pack all aged fourteen were heading back to school, along with my half-brother and best friend Embry and the only female werewolf in existence Leah. The rest of the Pack had either already graduated or like Quil and Jared had gotten their GED. For Leah who wanted school and the rest of us without a choice, that had meant sixteen hour shifts for Leah, Embry and I while the pups pulled ten hours a day for the entirety of summer.

Sam figured that it would make for less hard feelings in the Pack when school turned into our priority again. It was frustrating though, just a week ago we hadn't seen a vampire in nearly three weeks, not like the end of the school year when there had been an insurgence of them in the area that had made eleven young men and teenagers burst out of their skins and turn into vampire killing werewolves. We had tracked and killed them all and suddenly there weren't any more in the area just like there hadn't been for eight decades. Sam had been considering cutting back on the number of us running patrols at any one time and the frequency of patrols too but then _they_ had shown up.

The fucking Cullens. There were only two for the moment but today five more were supposed to arrive. They were non-human drinkers and our ancestors in their infinite wisdom had drawn up a treaty with them. We were supposed to co-habit the area with them under the condition that they wouldn't feed from or turn a human being and weren't allowed on La Push land, we couldn't come within a half mile radius of their home phased and they were free to hunt the animals that they fed on anywhere but on tribal land. In return we left them alone and they made sure that there was more than enough scholarship money for the council to send the tribe's best and brightest to college.

Sam didn't trust them. My father and the rest of the council didn't trust them. We were however a people of our word and until they broke faith with us we were bound to the treaty that our ancestors had made with them. Fucking retarded ancestors! Now Sam was keeping up patrol shifts and Leah and I had been forced to take our AP classes at Forks High instead of at the reservation school so that we could keep an eye on the fucking blood suckers better.

My life had taken a nose dive straight to hell and there was nothing that I could do about it. Fuck stupid werewolf genes, fuck stupid vampires, fuck god damned Sam Uley and his need to uphold a document from decades before we were thought about let alone born. I was pissed and tired, tired and pissed and I was about to explode. I wanted to kill something or some vampire, rip them to shreds and then watch them burn or maybe I just wanted to kill Sam.

_Get in line._ I got a quick visual of Leah and Sam's shared past that I didn't need as well as a punch to the gut of emotion and betrayal and over it all the desire to rip him and his imprint to shreds in revenge for what they had done to her life.

_Come up with a plan that he doesn't see coming and I might just help you mutilate Sam_. I growled softly as Leah's voice broke through the tirade that had been going through my head. Lately I had been the only one able to stand her presence so now we were practically always on patrol duty together. She was a royal bitch and bitter as hell, with good reason but she was fast and vicious in a fight. Yeah, right now I'd help her take out Sam.

_Sam's a hell of a lot smarter than Leah ever gives him credit for, I wouldn't get mixed up in her plots and schemes. _Embry's voice of reason cut through our conversation. _Not like Emily chose this to happen to her either, maybe cut them some slack guys. _Embry was right, as much as I wanted to hurt Sam for being a jackass, Emily she was a nice enough person and had only tried to make our lives easier rather than harder since the phase, I couldn't see myself being party to her getting hurt.

_God does every fucking male in the universe have a god damned boner for Emily. Poor scared Emily, innocent perfect homemaker Emily, kick me in the face Emily and I'll roll over so you can shoot me in the chest Emily. Fucking cock sucking bitch! _After a moment or two I tuned out Leah's aggressive train of thought. Leah had a chip on her shoulder, an understandable one at least until you had to live in her head day in and day out, and no one else seemed to be able to put up with it so I was stuck with her. _You're so much easier to live with Black._ She snapped at me as we ran out of La Push, skirting the Cullen's house as we headed toward the perimeter of Forks.

God, I just wanted this year to be over!


	2. Chapter 1

Hello!

Thanks for the reviews so far got to Grumpy DelSan13, Dottyanne and Brain In The Gutter (Check out her story Hellhounds and Demons a great read so far) I appreciate feedback so when you're done reading please do type a quick note and hit the review button, getting them in my inbox makes my day.

This story is Beta'd by SeptemberSkies without whom it would rougher then rough and there is a good chance it would also be a lot more confusing. Thank you for your time and effort!

Lastly, the same disclaimer from the beginning of the introduction still applies.

Happy reading (and reviewing)

* * *

Chapter One

(BPOV)

Forks, Washington. Middle of god knows where. Population: three thousand six hundred and ninety-two. The birth place of Charles and Renee Swan. My birth place. I should have grown up in this backwards slice of nowhere. I would have known each and every one of the people I would be going to class with come the morning. Instead I was a stranger in my home town. A home town that I felt absolutely no affinity toward, after all, Forks was just the seventh move in my life and the second that year.

Carlisle had felt that it was important for me to know where I came from and the family already had connections in the area which made the move that much easier. I had begged them to pick anywhere else in the world, even Alaska a place that I had confessed to hating when we had visited the Denali's over Christmas one year. When that had failed I had asked for the first time in my life to shed my own parents' last name to take the name Cullen. Again I was denied. Meeting old friends of my parents would perhaps give me answers to question that I had always had about them. Problem was, I didn't have many questions and it made me wonder if there was something fundamentally wrong with me.

It hadn't taken long to unpack my boxes and flop down on the living room couch next to Emmett. I had wrapped myself in a terrycloth bathrobe; my hands were laced around a hot cup of peppermint and chamomile tea as we watched_ Aliens_ for the hundredth time. He had an arm draped across my torso as my head rested on a pillow that I had put between it me and him. With the fire burning high in the fireplace, my tea and the hot water bottle I had pressed to my middle I found that I wasn't as cold as I would normally have been snuggled up to one of my siblings.

Esme, Rosalie and Alice had disappeared not long after the whirlwind unpacking (not that they had brought much, they didn't feel attachment like I did) and disappeared in Rosalie's Eclipse far away from the Fork's house. After being away from large crowds of people Jasper had been a little too on edge so Carlisle had taken him hunting leaving Emmett and I to our own devices, we didn't mind. Emmett and I had always liked being left to ourselves, it meant we could watch a horror movie or two without being interrupted or made to change to something more lighthearted.

"I still don't understand why we had to come here." I grumbled at him.

"Humans need other humans. It's like a rule." He didn't take his eyes from the flat screen.

"Do you think I'm wrong not wanting to become a vampire?" I turned suddenly to my friend and brother. I could see his jaw working as he thought; his eyes still glued on Ripley dressed in her giant loader-suit as she prepared to take on the alien queen.

'_Get away from her you bitch!'_ Ripley yelled as the queen turned and looked at her, it was in that moment that he turned his full attention on me. He was serious, from the heavy gaze of his golden caramel eyes to the flare of his nostrils and the set of his jaw. It wasn't often that I saw Emmett that serious and suddenly I wasn't sure if I wanted his answer.

"It'll hurt like hell when you're not around to do shit like this with or to tease mercilessly or talk to but I don't think that you're wrong." Ripley's fight to survive had become background noise. With Emmett there was always honesty minus the sugar coating and I loved him for it. "I'm pretty sure that if any of us could have chosen differently for ourselves we would have." There it was, the half-suspected secret, the forbidden truth that lay under the surface that I felt no one ever liked to voice when the rest of the family was around. They were happy, they loved each other and their lives together but there was also a lot that they would never experience because of what they were.

We went back to watching the movie and silence descended between us. I could feel Emmett thinking next to me but I chose to ignore it in favor of burrowing deeper into my pillow. By the time the credits were rolling I was almost fully relaxed again and my tea was gone. The clock on the mantel read nine; it was probably time to start thinking about sleep. I was sure that Alice would have me up at an ungodly hour so she could put me in the perfect outfit for my first day at Forks High.

"It's not going to be as bad as you think." He stated as he turned off the television and I sat up yawning loudly. "You might even make some friends or learn something new about yourself." I blinked at him, hoping that the expression on my face let him know that I was unconvinced by his positivity. "Alice and Rose will have a lot of the same classes as you and we'll all see each other at lunch. I'll give the boys that seem a little too friendly a hard time. It'll be entertaining."

"Is that before or after you make sure that Jasper doesn't make a snack out of a poor freshman." I rolled my eyes at him as he stood, offering me a hand which I took and he used to stand me on my feet next to him.

"Freshman are annoying." He snorted winking. "Just remember, it won't be that bad, it'll be fun."

"Right, Emmett, fun." I rolled my eyes but found that I was smiling anyway. At least I wouldn't be starting Forks High completely alone.

"Trust me, it will be." He kept a gentle hold on my hand as he pulled me along the hallway toward the garage. My mother and sisters must have returned from wherever they had spent the afternoon and evening.

"Did you guys have a good night? Alice said that you were watching horror movies again." Esme greeted us as they exited the garage and met us in the hall. Emmett let go of my hand as in a blur of bags and limbs Rosalie jumped into his arms, wrapping both legs around his waist as her lips fastened to his. I gave them an indulgent smile as Esme wrapped an arm around my shoulders.

Who wouldn't want a love like theirs and a thousand lifetimes to live in it?

I sighed. I wanted that. A love so all-consuming that it burned you up from the inside out. I wanted the kind of love that made forever seem short and that soothed the ache of loneliness that even my family couldn't hope to erase. In that I was just another typical seventeen year old girl who hadn't found her place in the world yet.

"Yeah watched Aliens again, it was kinda mindless. Dad took Jazz out hunting he was getting so edgy he couldn't sit still in the same room as me." I said, Esme kissed my temple and dropped a box the size of my palm into my hands. The box was made of a dark wood and wrapped in a little silver bow. I pulled on the silver bow and then opened the lid. On the black velvet cushion inside lay a set of car keys with the Ford insignia branded on them in blue and silver. "Mom?" I gave her a questioning look as Rosalie disentangled herself from Emmett a huge grin matching his on her face.

"It was about time you got your own vehicle so Carlisle and I decided to get you the truck that you've been trying to convince us that you need so badly." Esme was smiling at me. I stared at her then at the keys in the box. I had wanted a Ford F-150 ever since I got my driver's license at fifteen. "Rose drove it home. It's parked outside."

"She's beautiful Bella, Sterling grey, super crew cab, twin turbo 4X4. It's got all the bells and whistles and then some." Rosalie said enthusiastically as I turned grinning to them. I felt like my face was going to be split in half by my own smile.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!" I exclaimed over and over again. Esme laughed as I threw my arms around her neck and squeezed with all my pitiful human might.

"Does that mean you want to drive to school in the morning Bella?" Emmett laughed as I disentangled myself from Esme and wrapped my arms around my sister. Alice was noticeably absent but I figured that she had gone to find Jasper, as uncomfortable to be away from him as Rose was Emmett. The attachments that the females in my family felt toward their mates was astounding, according to Esme it took time and age to relax fully into the relationship.

"You sure as hell aren't." I winked at him and we walked together toward the kitchen. I was getting tired but I had missed my family as they had gone off to their own adventures. It had been a very long day.

There were some tangible perks to having a family of vampires. The fact that money had never been an issue was one of those many things, although I had never been given a present as extravagant as a brand new truck from my parents before. Alice loved to shower me with clothes and Jasper and Rosalie with the library that took up the most space in my room, but even those gifts were as much of a blessing as they were a curse. Perhaps it made me a little spoiled but the way I saw it, it helped them feel like they were balancing out the constant moving and the way that there were times that Jasper would get so edgy that Emmett wouldn't leave my side for days, or the stilling of a room and rapid holding of breaths if I got so much as a paper cut.

An hour and another cup of chamomile tea later I made my way upstairs to my bedroom. It looked identical to the room that I had left behind on Esme Island, the last place that we had lived before the move to rainy Forks.

It was plainly furnished, a queen sized bed stood against one wall with matching dresser, desk and two book shelves that each took up a full wall before meeting in a corner all made from mahogany. The set had belonged to a grandmother of Rosalie's and she felt it suited me far more than it did her.

The walls were cream, the curtains a deep blue that matched the bedspread and pillows. There were snapshots in black and white dotted around on the walls, mostly of my family, the places that we had been that I had loved the most, most of them taken by Emmett who was a shockingly wonderful photographer. There was very little clutter, it was neat and clean, a little pond of tranquility in an otherwise crazy world. It was my space. I took a deep breath grabbing the old pair of sweat pants and oversized T-shirt that I left out on the end of my bed after I had unpacked. I changed quickly, throwing my clothes in the corner that held my laundry basket not caring if I missed. I would pick them up in the morning.

Alice had made sure that everything would make me feel more at home. She had left a week before all of us with Carlisle to get the house ready. In code it meant packing up _his_ room. The infamous _him_, Carlisle's first son, the reason my parents were dead and I had been thrust into the world of the supernatural. I was sure that while there were certainly going to be old memories that there was physically nothing left of him here. His old room had been turned over for storage purposes and the only reason I even knew it was his was because I had noticed Esme's momentary pause and grief filled sigh that had crossed her lips the first time we had passed it bringing our things upstairs.

I lay down on my bed, pulling my duvet up to my ears and wondered what tomorrow was going to bring.

-BMR-

(JPOV)

I trudged over to the table that Leah had claimed at the edge of the Forks High cafeteria. None of the other students had approached her and who could blame them when she looked so eager to kill anyone that got too close. If the kids at Forks High hadn't been sure what to do when the natives had arrived, I was sure that they would be leaving us the hell alone now. Thank god, I wasn't exactly in the best mood.

While I hadn't seen a Cullen yet, it seemed like their sickly smell had permeated the whole school. I shuddered; while they smelled different than the human drinking vampires with a more old and loamy scent, I still wasn't sure how I was going to react to seeing one of them face to face surrounded by so many vulnerable humans.

One class after lunch and then I could go back to the confines and security of the rez. God I hated Sam Uley and the council so much!

"You haven't seen them yet, have you?" Leah finished her sandwich as I started on mine. I shook my head.

"They weren't in AP Chem." I mumbled through a mouthful of roast beef and cheddar on rye. "I take it you have?"

"You're really not going to like it Jake." Leah nodded before taking a bite out of her apple.

"No shit Sherlock." I already knew I wasn't going to like it; their somewhat diluted smell was already burning my nose and making my body feel like it wouldn't take much to have me explode into a wolf. The look on her face told me that there was much more to it than that. I raised an eyebrow at her and finished my sandwich.

"Sam said there were going to be five attending school right?" I gave her a look that I hope conveyed my desire for her to get to the point.

"Yeah; three females and two males." I shrugged.

"The three females were in AP Bio with me. Thick as thieves and calling themselves sisters, it was weird." I shuddered again and frowned. I couldn't help but feel sorry for her, that much leech so close and in a confined space had to have sucked. "That wasn't the worst of it," she was shaking her head. What could have been worse than that I wasn't sure and I certainly wasn't prepared for the words that came out of her mouth. "One of them is human Jake. A one hundred percent, fragile, living and breathing human girl."

"You're fucking with me." I glared at her, my appetite gone and a ripple that was almost agony running through my muscles from the tips of my toes to the crown of my head. The scent of leech was suddenly almost overwhelming. Leah's eyes narrowed and darkened but she wasn't glaring at me for once, she was glaring past me toward the entrance to the cafeteria. I swore that I could feel the joints in my body grating together as the hair stood up on the back of my neck. I turned; there they were, all five of the Cullens.

The males were polar opposites, one was huge, as tall as I was with short hair so brown it was almost black and built like he spent every spare minute of his life lifting weights. The other was shorter by a couple of inches and was much leaner, his chin length blonde hair was swept haphazardly back from his face, a face that looked pained in comparison with the cocky confidence on the other's. His eyes were a lighter shade of caramel then the rest of his companions, a shocking comparison to the crimson red that I was so used to seeing staring out of a vampire's face.

None of the females looked alike, although the tall blonde could easily have been genetically related to the blonde male, she was statuesque and I hated to admit that she looked more like she belonged on the cover of the swimsuit issue of _Sports Illustrated_ than in a high school cafeteria. The big male had one arm wrapped around her and was laughing as the smallest member of their group fluttered around them like a butterfly on crack. She was tiny, barely five feet tall with short black hair that shot out in every direction and pixie-like mischief all over her face.

Between her and the largest male walked the last of the females. Her humanity was undoubtable as her face flushed at a comment made by one of her companions. Dark brown hair tumbled down her back in perfectly styled waves to just below her ribcage, she had a heart shaped face and translucently pale skin you could almost see her blood flowing under. She was petite with a figure that was appealing enough on her perfectly proportioned frame which was about a foot shorter than her largest companion. The big one chose that moment to look over her head suddenly and lock eyes with me.

His face darkened as my teeth ground together and nostrils flared. One of his tree trunk sized arms reached out, wrapped around the human girl's shoulders and drew her close to his side. If he had been human I would have thought the gesture was protective, the girl instantly looked up at him a happy smile on her face as he broke eye contact with me to look back at her. The other male had stiffened, his senses now trained on me, his body angled toward Leah and I as they walked to the edge of the cafeteria furthest from us like he was ready to defend the rest of his coven.

"I can't sit in here and watch them with that poor girl." I stood up, fisting my brown paper bag that held the rest of my lunch in one hand. Leah's movement next to me was far more graceful but I could see the tension in her muscles.

"Told you so." She muttered but followed me outside anyway. There was safety in numbers and since there were only two of us, we were stuck with each other.

Fresh air, cold and moist, hit me in the face and I gulped it into my lungs like a drowning man. It was all too much, too fucking much! I felt like I was drowning in bloodsuckers with no escape. It was bad enough when I knew I was protecting the population of Forks High but knowing they had a human girl with them like some sick sort of pet that I couldn't protect made my sandwich do nasty flips in my stomach. I really was going to kill Sam Uley!

"It's like she doesn't realize that her life is in danger." Leah was standing next to me huffing in the same refreshing and mind clearing breaths that I was. "Did you see her all cuddled up to that big one?"

"Yeah, Leah," I ground out. It was a wonder I had any teeth left in my jaw. "I saw."

"Well try sitting in a class room with that going on in the row in front of you." She slid down the wall, letting her head fall back so it was resting against the side of the building, her eyes closed making her look relaxed even though I knew she was fighting her wolf as hard as I was and had been at it a whole lot longer too.

I looked down at her. She had been a beauty before her transformation and now looked like she should have been a sports model in her own right. She had deeply tanned russet skin stretched over well-defined muscles on a six foot tall frame, her black hair had been cut in a diagonal bob that started at her chin and sloped upward but she looked older. Her dark eyes holding a bitter contempt that made her seem like she had already seen a hundred years of heartache and sorrow instead of eighteen.

She had to be exhausted. I couldn't help but wonder if Sam was trying to kill her. The imprint thing had been awkward especially with two tortured individuals in your head, one guilt ridden and the other deeply bitter but Sam seemed to encourage rather than discourage her destructive behaviors. She was usually the least of us, with exception of Paul who never seemed to have himself under control, to be able to hold and control her temper and he had put her right in the middle of the lion's den. I wondered if he wanted her to self-destruct allowing us to hunt the Cullens mercilessly and putting both of them out of their misery.

"This day sucks." I grumbled.

"And we've only got another one hundred and seventy-nine to go." She chuckled her reply, her whole tone caustic. "Fuck Sam Uley."

"Only one of us has done that." I quipped at her, ruffling her short hair as she snarled at me halfheartedly. I wondered how much we had all underestimated Leah Clearwater and if she didn't like it exactly that way.

"He wasn't even that good." She muttered under her breath and I snorted. Unfortunately I had seen in her head and I knew she only half meant it.

"What's her name?" I asked after a few minutes of silence.

"What? Want to torture yourself with the knowledge that you can't do anything to save her?" There was an edge to Leah's voice. It was no secret that every human we hadn't managed to save from the vampires we hunted had become a weight on my heart and a black mark on my soul. I carried them with me, the image of a vacant face and a name that would never be used again.

"Leah, her name." I snapped. I was the Beta of my pack; I wasn't used to being questioned or ignored by anyone beside my Alpha and I would have an answer from her.

"Isabella Swan." She mumbled. My eyes snapped down to look at her again. I had the sudden image of the photo of my dad and his best friend that sat on the mantel at home rush to the forefront of my mind. "Yeah, I wondered too." She nodded, eyes still closed but I knew she could sense the intensity of my gaze and the question at the tip of my tongue. Her dad had been close with Charlie Swan too, they had all grown up together the same way that I had with most of the Pack.

"You think vampires killed Charlie and Renee Swan?" I frowned.

"Dad always said that it was a car crash when they were visiting Renee's parents. I don't remember what their kid was called, only that it had been adopted well before anyone here knew what had happened in Maine." She responded. "Last name is probably a coincidence."

"Yeah, maybe." I nodded my agreement but the problem was, I didn't believe in coincidences.

The bell signaling the end of lunch rang. My reprieve was over; it was time to go back to vampire hell. Just an hour and a half of AP English and I would be able to escape back into an afternoon and evening of the dull routine of patrol and sleep. Sam would need to know about the Swan girl being with the Cullens and then the weight of the decision making could leave my shoulders.

"Good luck." Leah breathed, pushing off the wall and getting back to her feet.

"You too." I mumbled knowing deep down that there was no way my previous luck would hold.

I was right. The pixie and the human girl were in my AP English class as I made my way to the back and sank down in my chair as far as my six foot five inch frame would allow. The pixie looked over her shoulder and wrinkled her nose at me like she smelled something bad. I glared at her; it wasn't exactly like she smelled like a bed of roses either. She turned back to the girl with her and said something too quietly for me to hear. The girl tossed her heavy dark locks over her shoulder and laughed a pleasant sound like bells ringing as her scent filled of vanilla and strawberries with just an undercurrent of vampire washed over me.

I gritted my teeth as my heart sank in my chest a little more. She lived with vampires, she had to know what they were but did she understand how much danger that her life was in? Did she want to be like them? Didn't she know there were other options, other ways to live her life?

I tried to ignore the crawling feeling under my skin and focus on the text that was being passed through the class. I looked down at the text that I had been passed to find _Sense and Sensibility_ by Jane Austen on the table, my groan joined that of most of the other males in the class. All I could remember of the book was the stupid movie with the stupid costumes and the antiquated way of speaking that my twin sisters had forced on me as a child.

"I know, I know." Miss O'Hare stood up from where she was leaning on her desk and tucked a piece of her short brown hair behind one ear. "What, if anything, can a modern day teenage boy learn from a romance novelist who died nearly two hundred years ago? I promise that you will all be surprised! We will spend the next couple of months working through Austen's completed novels, starting with _Sense and Sensibility_ and finishing with _Persuasion_. Without further discussion, let's begin." If it was possible I sank down deeper in my seat and resigned myself to my fate as Miss O'Hare, unaware of the danger to her classroom, began to speak about characters, themes and style.

I didn't think my life could possibly get any worse or more complicated until Isabella Swan turned her head, large almond shaped chocolate brown eyes locking with mine. My stomach flip-flopped, my heart tried to pound its way out of my chest and the whole world spun until I was lost and she was the center of everything that I was. In the same moment that I realized that life without her in it would be an impossible task my mind quickly reminded me that she was living a life with vampires.

I could feel the control that I had been holding onto by the skin of my teeth start to slip. I was up and out of my seat, across the room and out of the door as fast as possible, leaving a wake of commotion in my path. Less than a minute later I had burst outside, jogged into the forest and burst out of my skin, destroying a perfectly good set of clothes as I began to lose my mind.


	3. Chapter 2

Thanks for the reviews so far got to blackenedwolf, Dottyanne and moonstarlady57, Mandy May, Jenna, and Melodia. I appreciate your thoughts and comments so when you're done reading please do type a quick note and hit the review button, getting them in my inbox makes my day.

This story is Beta'd by SeptemberSkies without whom it would rougher then rough and there is a good chance it would also be a lot more confusing. Thank you for your time and effort!

Lastly, the same disclaimer still applies.

Happy reading (and reviewing)

* * *

Chapter 2

(JPOV)

I was running around and around in circles. I was going insane and I knew that I was crumbling to pieces fast and in a way that I hadn't thought possible. I wanted to run, to flee the reality that had so quickly and painfully become my own. I had set my nose north, prepared to run until I reached the end of the world but the beast in me was already bound to its mate and stubbornly wouldn't allow me to leave the area so I ran a wild pattern back and forward, around and around in circles in the forest near the school.

For the first time in months I felt alone in my head, just me and the beast at war with each other but no one else. It wasn't until I wondered where the rest of my Pack were and why they weren't where I felt they should be that suddenly I was bombarded with so many voice that it almost brought me to my knees. My brothers were there alright and my wordless turmoil was disturbing the Pack mind enough that everyone who hadn't been phased before had ended up doing the same mad rush from classes, work and home that I had. We were Pack, we were together and both Sam and Leah were frantically looking for me even as they bickered over who was at fault for my mental breakdown.

Leah got to me first, her slender grey form taking up her usual spot to my right and just keeping pace with me. Her mind was looping a string of obscenities that ended in a phrase designed to get my full attention or to encourage Sam to shut up, curl up and die. He was stalwartly ignoring her and appeared as a black statue directly in my path bringing my frenzied run to an abrupt stop. He looked at me with eyes filled with endless sympathy and understanding. He knew I had imprinted. All eleven of the Pack knew and the wall of compassion made my muscles tremble where I stood.

_Keep an eye on the area around the school!_ Sam's order settled over Leah who snapped and snarled at him, resisting his command almost as well as I had learned how and longer than any of my brothers could have before snorting derisively and turning away from us. _Phase!_ His second command was clearly for me. For as long as I had been phasing his commands had chafed against me, pealing at my skin like someone had taken a cheese grater to it. I was born to be Alpha but until now I lived knowing that I wasn't ready, that I had too much to learn; now I knew that I would never, could never be ready. I gave into his command until I stood in front of him. He shucked on a pair of shorts and threw another pair at me.

"You called the whole Pack to you." Sam said as I pulled the shorts on and then faced him.

"It wasn't intentional." I couldn't keep the hostility out of my tone.

"Imprinting happens Jacob." Sam said in a tone meant to be soothing. "It's complicated and difficult but there are positive as well." I couldn't be sure at which point during Sam's opener on imprinting that I had started laughing but I was laughing hard by the time he said the last word. He did not look amused but then despite my laughter neither was I.

"You don't even know what's going on down there!" Suddenly I was angry again as I pointed in the direction that I was one hundred percent certain that the high school was in, if for no other reason than I felt like I had an invisible string pulling me relentlessly in the direction of _her_.

"You imprinted on a girl called Isabella Swan." He was short with me. "Spent a little too much time in the same building as vampires and with your imprint nearby…" He stopped talking again when I turned and buried my right hand into the closest tree trunk.

"She lives with them Sam. Follows them around like some weird sort of pet. Calls them family." I withdrew my hand, feeling the skin and bone heal almost as quickly as it had broken. I couldn't bring myself to look at him, to see the expression of disgust and sympathy that I knew would be etched on his face because I knew if the situation was reversed I would have looked and felt similar.

"They can't hurt her Jacob. They cannot feed from her or turn her. They know that." There was a new tremor in his voice but his words were just words and didn't comfort me. How long had they had her before bringing her here? How easily would they disappear with her when they had had enough of Forks?

"Until they move her away. Until she decides she would rather live the life of a vampire." The sound of bone grinding and sinew popping was coming from my body I realized as I fought the wolf. His instinct was to protect and destroy.

Fuck!

The pain in my body drove me to my knees. My soul throbbed. By my very nature I was destined to hurt the one being on the planet that meant more than life to me. The only way I knew of preserving her life would be to destroy the creatures that she called family. I knew what it felt like to lose one parent and even that much pain I wouldn't choose to inflict on an enemy but I was sure there could be no reconciliation between the Pack and a coven of bloodsuckers. All that my future and her future could hold was more pain and heartache.

"There has never been a recorded or spoken of instance where an imprint was rejected. Emily and Kim both had similar experiences. They said that being too far away for too long without contact physically affects them." He was pacing in front of me. "We'll call the coven leader, go over the treaty again and make sure they understand that we will hunt them no matter where they go if they harm her."

"We can't keep an eye on her every second of the day." I groaned.

"No, but you will know if something is wrong and we'll be ready." There was iron and violence in his voice but I was afraid that we wouldn't be able to prevent and could only plan for an eventuality that would destroy my soul.

"I'll talk to my mother tonight." Leah's voice said from a ways away. She was making no move to come closer than just within hearing range. I was sure that her eyes and body were still focused in the direction of the school. "I'll transfer full time over here and keep an eye on things close up."

"Leah." I said her name and didn't know what to say next but I was grateful toward her, more than I probably had been any other time in my life. Leah was a bitch and there were times that I hated being near her but we understood each other and I knew she was giving me a gift that I wasn't sure she would give anyone else.

"No." Sam's voice was tight again.

"Don't try and grow a conscience now." She snarled.

"You won't be able to maintain focus with vampires around you all of the time. I won't let you do this." There was a level of protectiveness in his voice that I found uncomfortable and I knew that Leah hated more than anything.

"Try and stop me Uley. The Elders will see things the way I do and since you're just interim Alpha you'll have to listen to them." She threw back at him.

"You'll do as you're told." He snapped.

"Bite me." Her voice trailed back to us as I took a deep breath and filled my lung with much needed air as the sound of her phase echoed off the trees. I looked up at Sam, ready to argue for her interference and found that I didn't have to. His face was grave, his countenance unhappy but already resigned as he locked eyes with me. "Join up with the twins so Jared can go have some time with Kim. Run the borders but stay away from the Cullen house. Leah will keep an eye on things with Embry from a little closer. I'll let you know what the Coven says once I've spoken with them." The weight of the Alpha order washed over me and I let it consume me knowing that there would be no form of peace for me any other way as I gave into the beast.

-BMR-

(BPOV)

I stood up and gathered my books with relief as the final bell of the day rang. I used one hand to rub the back of my neck while the other slung my backpack onto my shoulder. My head was pounding, all the muscles in my neck and shoulders felt far too tight. It had been a long day and I was exhausted. I hadn't been prepared for the amount of attention that my family and I had gotten all day from the rest of the population of Forks High but then I hadn't been in a public school since I was ten years old and it was felt that my education would be better served at home where it could be tailored to my pace of learning.

The girl in my math class, Angela, had been nice, quiet and thoughtful but her friends that I had met through the day had been an interesting bunch. Jessica and Lauren were clearly the center of senor gossip; Eric, Tyler and Mike were more interested in chasing the rest of the senior girls around than they were in school; and Angela's boyfriend Ben hadn't said a word to me when we were introduced. Being able to retreat to the boundaries that I understood within my own family had been a ready relief when they had been in my classes and at lunch but I felt unsettled like I was constantly being watched or maybe it was just Rosalie attracting too much attention again.

"Heard AP English was exciting." Jasper said when he met us in the hallway. He pulled my backpack lightly from my shoulder and slung it over his own to join his bag. I rolled my eyes but didn't protest the gesture as I dug into my jacket pocket for my truck keys. I lovingly stroked the Ford insignia, unable to believe my luck once again, as I pulled them from my pocket and walked through the door that Jasper was held for me.

Jasper felt bad about the night before. He always felt bad for the moments that he found it hard to live in the same house as a human being. If it wasn't for Alice and I, I wasn't sure that he would ever had decided to fight his nature and stick to a vegetarian diet but I loved him anyway. The next few days would be filled with his apologetic gestures and then things would go back to normal until the next time that the thirst got to him and he made Emmett become my personal bodyguard. I looked over at Alice who was giggling silently as she looped her arm through mine. She knew that her lover's actions were unnecessary that I never blamed him for his struggles but, like me she knew that he blamed himself and letting him act the gentleman made him feel better in the end.

"Yeah, exciting." I shook my head. That was one way to put it. "There was this guy. I could almost swear that he looked at me and I physically hurt him somehow, because he took one look at me and was out of his chair and the class room before anyone could stop him. It was bizarre wasn't it Alice?" I looked at her as I unlocked my truck. Jasper threw the bags in the back seat and leaned against the door he had closed again looking impassively at us.

"He was Quileute." She said by way of confirming what I said and her words were certainly not meant as a compliment. I got a heavy sensation in my stomach and a sudden need to defend him. Instead I took a deep breath and leaned against my truck as I bit my tongue. I was sure that it wouldn't take Rose and Emmett long to find us so we could head home and I could have some time to myself.

My head throbbed and then suddenly the pressure released without warning. I couldn't help the sigh of relief that passed my lips as the pain disappeared. My pleasure was short lived as I realized that my siblings were giving me a strange look and I got a secondary feeling of being watched like I had red hot laser beams boring holes in the side of my head. I wasn't sure what was more uncomfortable; the headache or the sensation of being watched. I turned my head to the left and froze.

A giant russet colored wolf, easily the size of a small horse was standing just inside the tree line staring intently at me. Even my heart seemed to stop beating for a moment as I locked eyes with it. I knew I should feel afraid. I knew I should alert Jasper and Alice. I didn't, I didn't because I felt calm, intrigued, even safe. I blinked, it was gone and Alice's hand was on my shoulder.

"Bella?" She was frowning. I looked at her blinking again and the pounding headache returned full force like I had never had a moment of reprieve making me wince. "Are you okay? You don't look so good." She was frowning.

"It's just a bad headache Alice." I said in hopes of deflecting any sort of further attention.

"You should talk to Carlisle about it when we get home. Do you want me to drive?" She said as she looked distractedly in the direction that I had been looking.

"No, I'd like to have my truck for more than twenty four hours before you total it." I replied and looked over at the tree line again. There was nothing there. Not a shadow or a moment in the trees. What I had seen, I had only seen for a split second, it had disappeared without a trace in the time it had taken me to blink. Had it even been there? Did Washington's Olympic Peninsula house wolves the size of horses so bold that they would prowl around densely populated areas? Why did I feel like I didn't want my siblings to know what I had seen?

"You say that like I've always caused the accidents that have led to my vehicular upgrades." She said she shared a look with Jasper that I wasn't even going to try to decipher and again with Rosalie and Emmett who had arrived at my side. I smiled a greeting and got in the driver's seat of the truck before anyone could argue with me. Rose gave me a strange look as she got in the passenger seat and the rest piled in the back, I shrugged at her and she frowned as I pulled out of the school parking lot. It didn't take us long to get home, for me to park my truck and for us to file into the house.

It smelled strongly like snickerdoodles in the hallway as we entered. Esme had been baking again and I was sure that there were enough cookies to feed me and a small army as well. My mother always had a hard time with moderation when she got it into her head to cook which is why I'd insisted on taking over cooking the majority of my own meals by the time I was thirteen. Her heart was in the right place but I couldn't keep the hungry kids in Africa out of my head.

"How was school?" Esme's voice drifted up from the kitchen as we all dispersed to different corners of the house.

"Fine." My voice joined in with four others as I headed for the stairs that would lead me to my room. I wanted to take a couple of aspirin and then I wanted to find out everything I could about wild wolves in the Northern United States and then I wanted to take a nap to help kill my headache.

I dumped my backpack in my room before hitting the bathroom medicine cabinet for aspirin. Had there ever even been wolves on the Olympic Peninsula? I took the aspirin as I wandered back into my room and closed the door. I put my water glass down on my bedside table as I discarded my jeans for a pair of sweatpants and pulled down the blinds over the large windows that took up almost a whole wall of my room. How big could wolves get, surely not the size of a horse? I opened my laptop and hit the power button. I wasn't going to get any sleep until I had some answers.

I pulled up google and typed in _wolves in northern USA_. Dozens of websites all on the same topic, the way that grey wolves were systematically wiped out in the lower forty-eight states. By the 1960s there were none known to be left in the United States. Since they were put on the endangered species list in 1973 wolves have slowly been reintroduced to the lower forty-eight successfully but the closest wolf packs to Forks were still hundreds of miles away and American Grey Wolves didn't fit the picture of what I had seen earlier.

At their biggest they could only get to five and a half feet long, three feet tall and about eighty to ninety pounds. What I saw was at least seven feet long and at least five and a half feet tall and probably weighed at least four hundred pounds. There was no way that something that big lived in the woods and no one knew about it.

I chewed on my lower lip and pulled up a new window with a new search page. I thought for a second and then typed in _Quileute_. The basic information was simple, a native people who had settled on a piece of land known as La Push in 1855 after an agreement with the United States government. They were a small community led by a tribal government headed by one William Black. It was the legends that were interesting and made adrenaline rush through my body.

_Then Q'waeti' went on and reached the Quileute land. He saw two wolves. There were no people here. Then Q'waeti' transformed the wolves into people. Then he spoke to the people saying: "The Quileute shall be brave, because you come from wolves," said Q'waeti'. "In every manner you shall be strong."_

Men turning into wolves. I blinked and sucked my lower lip into my mouth as I slowly typed _werewolf _into the search engine. Oxford was quick to define the term to mean, a person (in folklore) who changes for periods of time into a wolf, typically when there is a full moon. A fit healthy man could weigh between a hundred and seventy and two-hundred and fifty pounds which could possibly translate into a much larger wolf than grey wolves.

What the hell was I thinking? Only that since vampires exist, why not other mythical creatures too? It made sense on a level that werewolves, which were always a vampire's mortal enemy in folklore, also existed. But the images that came up in the search engine looked nothing like the animal that I saw. It looked like a wolf that grew two or three times too large, not like a Syfi channel human wolf hybrid.

"Urg!" I groaned, I was making absolutely no sense. I snapped the lid shut on my laptop as another wave of pounding in my head made me wince. I needed to try and shake the stupid thing before I could get my own mind to think straight. I set my alarm for an hour later and crawled under my large goose down duvet and pulled it up to my chin as I settled my head on my pillow to sleep. There was no way that people of any kind were descended from or turned into wolves, was the last thought that passed through my head before I let sleep take me.

_The world I was in looked older somehow, more natural than any other place that I had ever been. The trees were old, tall and lush, the air crisp and clean and the paths were little more than deer trails leading toward untold secrets. The sun peeked out from behind a light cloud cover and I smiled almost despite myself. I loved the sun and there was such a sense of belonging here._

_I walked without growing tired and without a sense of time passing. The headache that had plagued me as I feel asleep was gone and I felt invigorated and at peace. Somehow, I knew that I was supposed to be there, like I was a part of this place somehow. I knew the path that I was on would eventually lead me where I was supposed to be, the sounds of the forest were comforting and I knew home was nearby._

_There was a rustling in the leave to my right but I ignored it. I knew this forest, I knew that I was safe, protected and that nothing that was supposed to be there was going to hurt me. There was another rustle, this time from behind me. I turned and looked to see a giant wolf step out from the trees, lips curled back to show off long razor sharp fangs, ears pinned back against its skull and the hair along its neck and back standing on end as it looked at me. _

_I turned and ran, ran right into hard, unforgiving marble. I looked up and blinked. I didn't know the face that I looked at but I knew to be afraid, perhaps more so than of the wolf behind me as a porcelain arm reached out and the hand was attached to it wrapped cool digits around my neck. He was breathtakingly beautiful, his golden brown hair caught the light, his flawless skin sparkled in the moments where the true sun light hit him. Crimson eyes, the exact color of freshly drawn blood looked at me, moved from my eyes to my mouth, along the line of my jaw to my jugular vein. His mouth twisted into a crooked smile, his teeth were pearly white and coated in an iridescent liquid that dropped off of sharp canines._

_The wolf snapped and snarled from behind me but came no closer and my captor only gave it a fleeting glance like it was of little significance. "There is nothing you can do to protect her now." His smile was cruel._

_I wanted to scream, I wanted to fight back somehow but I knew that my time was up. I knew that I was looking into the eyes of my own death and that there was nothing that my frail and trembling body could do to stop it. The wolf snapped and whined, paws pacing the forest floor behind me. He bent his head, his eyes fixed on the wolf, his nose brushed the corner of my jaw before he pressed ice cold lips to my neck, directly over the spot where my pulse was so visibly beating a staccato rhythm. His lips brushed my skin as they pulled away from razor sharp teeth, teeth that sliced through my skin like a knife cutting through soft butter. Fire entered my veins and the air around us was shattered by my screams. _


	4. Chapter 3

Thanks for the reviews for the last chapter go to Grumpy DelSan13, Astilbe, Rose, melodia, Dottyanne, blackenedwolf, wayliz and Mandy may, your reviews have all made me smile. Thank you for the encouragement. I appreciate your thoughts and comments so when you're done reading please do type a quick note and hit the review button, getting them in my inbox makes my day.

This story is Beta'd by SeptemberSkies without whom it would rougher than rough and there is a good chance it would also be a lot more confusing. Thank you for your time, effort and words of encouragement SeptemberSkies!

Lastly, the same disclaimer from the introduction still applies.

Happy reading (and reviewing)

* * *

Chapter 3

(BPOV)

I sat up quickly, pushing my duvet off as I gathered my legs under me and made for the door. My heart was still pounding as I ran down the stairs, past a concerned looking Jasper, and into Carlisle's study. I slammed the door shut harder than I meant to behind me and looked steadily at my father. He put down the medical journal that he had been reading and looked levelly at me, clearly unsure what to make of my entrance. I shoved my hands in the pockets of my sweats and frowned at him.

"How's the headache?" He asked me. He had clearly been talking to Alice.

"It's annoying." I shrugged not sure how else I was supposed to describe it.

"Did the aspirin help?" He frowned.

"Didn't make a difference." I replied.

"If it is still bothering you later, let me know and I will give you something stronger to help." He smiled encouragingly at me.

"I'll let you know." I nodded and took a deep breath, biting at my lower lip with my teeth.

"Now, what did you really want to talk to me about?" He enquired.

"Remember when I was twelve and we were up in Alaska with the Denalis and I cut myself and almost sparked World War Three?" I asked him.

He nodded. Emmett had been preoccupied keeping Jasper under control, Alice and Rosalie had fled the smell and Esme had done her best to keep me from passing out until Carlisle had arrived. It wouldn't have been that big a deal if we had been at home and not visiting with the Cullen's friends. Only Kate and Tanya had been in the house, which was probably the only reason I was still alive. Rosalie had been able to keep Tanya away but Kate's ability had Esme and Alice incapacitated before there was time to blink. Carlisle got there just in time to stop her from actually biting me but not before she had licked the blood from the cut on the palm of my hand.

There hadn't been enough venom to cause any lasting damage besides an inch and a half puckered line of cold scar tissue on my palm. It wasn't necessarily the incident as a whole that I was referring to, but the aftermath of it. While I knew that my family members were vampires I hadn't ever been told what that truly meant. I had no idea that my blood was as attractive to them as drugs to an addict. I hadn't known that my parents had died because my blood sang to Carlisle's son so strongly that he couldn't fight the craving, or that even to the rest of the vampires who had smelt it, my blood smelt just that little bit sweeter than average. Until that moment I didn't know what it was to be bitten or turned and the consequences that came after.

"I remember the whole family making an agreement not to keep me in the dark or lie to me any more when it came to things that affected this family or my safety." I said, even as my pulse raced ahead fuelled by the residual adrenaline my nightmare had produced.

"Yes, we did." He nodded again.

"Then why didn't you tell me that there were werewolves in Forks?" I asked. In truth I hadn't been sure that I was right until I saw the expression on my father's face as I asked the question, and suddenly I felt a little weak and sick to my stomach. There were other supernatural creatures out there and we were now living right in the middle of their territory. I went to rub my temple to ease the headache that I hadn't thought of for a few moments only to realize that it was slowly easing, perhaps the aspirin was taking effect after all.

"They aren't exactly werewolves and they don't pose a threat to you or directly to the family." He replied. Esme calling his name from the living room broke his train of thought. She sounded worried, upset even.

"I'm with Bella right now." He called back to her never taking his eyes off of me.

"You didn't think that I should know?"

"Many of your father's friends were descendants of the - " He was unable to finish his sentence before Esme spoke again.

"The Quileutes are here!" She sounded tense and Carlisle stood up from his chair and moved out of the office without further comment, his pace much quicker than normal leaving me to rush at a regular human speed behind him. What did she mean the Quileutes were here? Had the whole native community decided to descend on our doorstep? Why would that worry her? And then my mind started to further connect the dots that the fogginess of sleep had hidden from me. The werewolves that weren't really werewolves were Quileutes, they were descended from wolves according to their legends, why wouldn't it make sense that they still turned into them at will?

"Holy cow!" I exclaimed as I ran into the living room so that I could see out of the giant windows that lined the room from floor to ceiling not unlike the ones in my bedroom. There were six snarling oversized wolves, each easily the size of a racehorse, in our backyard headed up by a half-naked man wearing only a pair of cut off shorts who wouldn't have seemed out of place on an MBA basketball court. I tried to put the brakes on my dead run and ended up catching the hem of my sweatpants with one foot, a move that was destined to land me on my butt if it weren't for Esme's quick reaction time. Millimeters from contact with the hard wood floor she scooped me up and set me back on my feet. "What are they doing here?" I breathed as Alice came to stand next to me. The man was looking at us through the window though I knew they couldn't see us through the one way glass, so were the rest of the wolves, all except the russet colored one I had seen at the school.

"They're making sure that you're still human." Esme said softly.

"And then they'll go away?" I looked at Alice for confirmation.

"I don't know." She replied with a shrug of her dainty shoulders. "I can't see anything, it's all static." Her voice was strained, like she was still trying and coming up empty. Perhaps her gift was still 'malfunctioning', as she had put it over the last few months as her ability to see my future more than a couple of days or hours ahead had lessened, she'd even had trouble with Carlisle, Esme and Emmett on occasion in a way she had sworn she never had before and didn't happen with Jasper and Rosalie.

"Why is dad out there alone?" I asked as Carlisle walked from around the front of the house to stand in front of wolves. He was conversing calmly with the half-dressed man, his hands clasped firmly behind his back, his posture otherwise relaxed and calm as if he didn't realize that the wolves in front of him looked like they wanted to kill him. Especially the big russet one that was pacing back and forward like a trapped wild animal just looking for an opening to escape its confinement, it looked threatening, aggressive and frantic, like it was taking the willpower of the other five beasts in front of it to stop it charging forward and attacking.

"It's better if we appear less threatening to them." Esme responded but she didn't sound like she was happy about Carlisle's choice as the Quileute man responded to my father's words with large gestures and an angry expression. "One of their patrol said they heard you screaming. They came to check to see if you had been hurt." She looked down at me, her perfect brow creased slightly as she looked to me for some sort of enlightenment.

"You would have heard me if I had been screaming." I shook my head, thinking back. I had looked up werewolves on the computer, taken a nap and – _crimson eyes, the color of freshly drawn blood, iridescent liquid dripping off of a razor sharp crooked smile, the icy cold of marble lips as they were drawn back and teeth ripped through the skin of my neck _– I felt all my muscles stiffen, the adrenaline start pumping again as the memory of my dream sent a thrill of fear up my spine. I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to dispel the sudden onslaught of emotion. "I had a nightmare. I was screaming in my nightmare." I whispered and Alice looked at me like she wasn't sure why that information was relevant.

The russet wolf snarled viciously, making me jump as it ramped up its pacing and pushed through the others. It took up position next to the man who was talking to Carlisle and I couldn't help but recognize the posture that it had taken. He was getting ready to launch an attack on Carlisle. I didn't think, I just reacted, heading out of the living room and through the front door as quickly as I could only to be caught in Rosalie's tight grasp before I could make it around the corner of the house and into the backyard.

"Where do you think you're going?" She asked with one eyebrow raised as she caught me.

"It's going to attack dad!" I cried. She gave me a look clearly meant to get me to shut my mouth but didn't relax her grip at all. Jasper and Emmett were standing just in front of her; Esme appeared with Alice at our side.

"They aren't going to hurt Carlisle and even if they were, you would be the least effective in stopping them." Rosalie hissed at me. I glared at her, clenching my jaw. Had she been listening to the conversation in the yard at all? They were here because they thought that I was hurt. The quickest way to defuse the situation was to prove to them that I was alive and well, maybe then they would stop their aggressive posturing and leave us in peace.

"Let her go Rose." Esme said softly, reaching out and taking my hand firmly in one of her own. Rosalie's arm relaxed and then slipped down so that it was at her side again, she glared at Esme as she walked us past my siblings. "Seeing she's whole will help and it would probably be best to introduce the whole family anyway." She explained and they trailed a step or two behind us, with the exception of Emmett who took it upon himself to throw an arm around my shoulders. We were going to present a united front but it seemed he was also determined to keep himself firmly in the role of my own personal bodyguard.

"Mr. Uley, I would like to present to your pack, my family." Carlisle said without turning or missing a beat as we stopped a few paces behind him. "My wife Esme, my children Emmett and Rosalie, arranged the Treaty with your ancestors. Jasper and Alice were not with us when the original Treaty was signed but are more than aware of its limits and will adhere to them as strictly as the rest of us. As for Bella, you can see for yourself that she is well and whole and unharmed." Carlisle turned and smiled, holding out a hand and beckoning for me to join him where he stood.

I looked at the wolves gathered less than five feet from my father and the varied faces with the same expression on them all. They saw my family as prey and they wanted to kill them, even the one who was human had a thinly veiled mask of contempt on his face. The russet wolf, however, was looking at me like it forgot that the rest of the world was around it. Its gaze was intense and I shuddered under the weight of it as I cringed closer to Esme and Emmett's fingers tightened on my shoulder. The wolf snarled, taking a step forward until the man pushed it none too gently, it turned its giant head and its jaws snapped shut on air only six inches from the man's face.

"Jacob that is enough!" He snapped, pushing the wolf again as its giant mouth seemed to glue itself shut and he whined as he looked in my direction again. The wolf had a name and it was a nice one, I found myself thinking as I looked back at him strangely intrigued by the half pained expression that appeared every time he looked at me. "The Treaty was put in place for the protection of human life Dr. Cullen, keeping a human as a pet is not in keeping with the Treaty or the preservation of human life that was agreed upon with our ancestors." He spoke clearly and suddenly I was angry.

"I am not a pet!" I snapped, letting go of my mother's hand and shrugging off Emmett as I marched to where Carlisle stood and then took a step past him toward the large man. While the Denalis and other friends of the family certainly hadn't understood the attachment that my family had toward me and I to them, none of them had ever dared insinuate that I was a pet the same way that other families would keep a cat or a dog.

"Bella, sweetheart, it's okay." Carlisle said softly. He was so calm about everything as if these creatures who didn't even know us had every right to have opinions on a situation that they didn't know the first thing about but unlike him, I couldn't stop my temper from rising.

"No, dad, it's not okay!" I snapped. I was trembling I was so angry as I stabbed a finger toward a chest that rivaled Emmett's in musculature and was so defined he looked like he could have won a Mr. Universe pageant. "How dare you march into my family's backyard with six aggressive, oversized attack dogs and presume to know anything about us. How dare you belittle the relationship that I have with my parents and siblings. How dare you presume to be able to tell me how it is I should or shouldn't live my life, it is none of your business." I was breathing hard as I tried to control what was left of my temper. I looked momentarily over my shoulder at Jasper and frowned, wondering at the lack of interference until I realized that his eyes were focused on the wolves in front of me and he was concentrating hard.

"I don't think you understand how grave the danger to your health is, Isabella. Vampires are fickle creatures, they will grow bored of you, find you to be as appetizing as anyone else and then they will kill you." Mr. Uley said patiently like he was talking to a particularly stupid child. Emmett snarled as a string of explicates tumbled from Rosalie's mouth to mix with words of protest that were coming from Esme and Alice. It was all noise ringing in my ears as my open hand connected with a force even I hadn't been expecting to the tall man's face.

My hand was numb and then it was stinging and throbbing as I retracted it and cradled it with my other hand, my eyes wide and my heart sinking to my stomach as I realized what I had done. I had just provoked a werewolf. His already dark eyes seemed to turn black, the way that Jasper's did when he was agitated or hungry. The muscles along his neck and jaw seemed to ripple and pop as I took one shaky step back and then another as he took one toward me.

"That is enough Mr. Uley!" Carlisle's voice was sharp as I felt his arm reached out and pull me back toward him even as the russet wolf moved between me and him, his lips pulled back showing large white fangs and he growled at his own leader. I couldn't take my eyes off them or stop wondering what was going to happen next as they glared at each other. Carlisle had walked us back two more steps as he took the hand I was cradling into his and was gently probing along the line of my metacarpals. We were close enough to the family that they could get to me now before either of the wolves in front of us.

"Back up, Sam!" It was no longer a wolf that stood between me and the man I had assaulted but another man, equally as tall and intimidating as the first but unlike Sam Uley, he was completely naked. I couldn't help myself, my eyes traveled from the small of his back, up his spine to his shoulders and neck, amazed at the way that the muscles flexed under deeply tanned skin that looked as smooth as silk. I found myself wanting to reach out and touch that skin, to know what it felt like under my fingers and even as I stopped myself acting on the impulse I felt heat rush to my face.

"No one is going to hurt her, Jacob." My eyes snapped to Sam's face as he spoke but the man's words did nothing to make me feel better or make Jacob back away from him.

"Then back up." Jacob's rich baritone reverberated around us, making a shiver run up my spine.

"Dr. Cullen, I think that a frank discussion between us is in order. Do you have a private place where we can speak?" Sam looked past Jacob to where we stood, ignoring the request to back away from where he was standing. I looked up at Carlisle, his fingers had stilled, my hand held gently between his two much cooler ones and I had to admit that the throb was being dulled by the cold.

"Perhaps a discussion would benefit us all." He nodded, his face serious. "While I understand that you most likely don't feel comfortable coming inside alone, I would prefer that you only bring who you feel absolutely has to be a part of this discussion into our home. The rest of your Pack are welcome to stay outside and wait for you but any attempt to come inside will be seen as a further act of aggression on your part."

"Agreed." He nodded his nostrils flared, jaw clenched and neck muscles so tight every muscle and tendon was clearly defined. "Jacob, put some shorts on, Leah, you too. Jared, keep the kids in line and the rotation going. Unless there are obvious signs of distress, stay where you are. And someone call Emily and let her and the girls know what's going on." Sam Uley gave out commands like a man who was used to having them followed before taking a step forward. The smallest of the wolves, light grey in color took off for the tree line and I took an instinctive step back only to be stopped when I ran right into my father's stationary figure. Jacob didn't make a move to either put on shorts or get out of Sam's way.

"Rosalie, why don't you take your sister inside? Jasper, Emmett, Alice, would you please keep an eye on our guests?" Carlisle's voice was light and even but it was Alice that fluttered to my side and hooked an arm through mine, not Rosalie who remained at Emmett's side glaring at the wolves.

"Coming?" Alice smiled at me and I took a deep breath before nodding. She led me back into the house, the back of my neck burning where I could feel _his_ eyes on me. Those liquid dark eyes that had locked to mine just once, and for only a millisecond, yet I couldn't get them out of my head.

-BMR-

(JPOV)

A shiver of fear that I knew wasn't my own had grabbed my attention from my calculus homework and had me moving for the door, but it was terror and a scream so intense it took the air from my own lungs that made me phase on the back porch and take off running toward the Treaty line. I knew what I felt and I knew what terror like that meant. Isabella was fighting for her life if she wasn't already mortally wounded. I had to get to her, I had to protect her!

_Jacob?_ Sam's voice in my head was quickly joined by his black form matching pace with mine. I didn't try to explain I just thrust my memories and feelings at him. _Paul, Jared, Leah, Embry, Tristan catch up. Quil, Nathan the girls are at Emily', get to them and protect them! The rest of you pups tighten up the patrol. Nothing gets past us._

_Isabella! _Her name looped through my mind like a skipping record until her emotion was gone.

_Did she get bit? _Tristan slipped alongside me and I growled at him.

_How long does it take someone to turn into a leech anyway? _Jared mused and I tried to block out the panic that that question made flare through my body.

_Who the fuck knows? _It was Embry that sounded incredulous and I felt his shoulder bump against mine. My brother was with me and he had my back.

_The girls are freaking out, what's going on? Emily's not going to be able to stop Rachel taking a chunk out of Quil if we can't give her answers soon._ Through Nathan's eyes we could see Emily trying to calm my sister down as she screamed at Quil and Kim huddled in a rocking chair on Emily's porch, her large eyes filled to the brim with liquid. Jared's discomfort was palpable but somehow he managed to stop himself turning and running back in the direction of Emily's house, although a much quieter chant all his own joined mine.

_We'll kill those fucking leeches and then we'll get back to the imprints! _Paul snarled, he would protect my sister to the death and I knew it, but he also knew as well as I did that she was a firecracker and the only person in any real danger was Quil. Emily was nowhere near as fragile as Kim but Racheal was a few rungs on the ladder above even her when it came to backbone.

_You're probably over reacting; you imprint people always over react, panicking if a poor girl get so much as a paper cut. _Leah was scornful and easily dodged Jared's teeth, snapping and snarling right back at him until Sam came between them. Her words were only half serious; I could feel the twist in her gut as memories of the 'Swan girl,' as she was happy to label her, floated through her head again. Those beautiful brown eyes smiling up at a tank of a vampire, the way she walked arm in arm with the tiny female...

I would kill them all, rip them to shreds and watch them burn if she had so much as a mark on her or a hair out of place. But I was powerless, _Isabella, _the Treaty made me powerless, _Isabella,_ the fact that her family were vampires made me powerless, _Isabella,_ and now all I could do was hope and pray that my life wasn't about to end before it had ever had a chance to begin.

_Focus! _Our Alpha snapped.

_We'll get her Jake._ There was conviction in Embry's mind that I wished I had in my own as Sam forced us all to stop in the trees just outside the clearing that held the Cullen's mansion-like home. He held us there by willpower alone while he phased and then led us forward.

"Don't do anything stupid Jacob." Sam ordered when he came to a stop and looked pointedly at the house. It didn't take long for the two males from school and the blonde female to appear at the side of the house and only half a second longer for Dr. Cullen, the coven's leader, to move at a steady pace past them and come to stand in front of us.

"I haven't had a chance to discuss your phone call with my family yet, Mr. Uley." His voice was smooth and light, pleasant in a way that was meant to make you trust him, but his scent repulsed me as I paced behind the line my Pack made.

"The girl was screaming, Dr. Cullen." Sam snapped. "Did you bite her? Let one of your twisted little family have her for dinner?" As the timbre of his voice got louder I couldn't stop my growl from joining in and then the knot of fear that had been in my chest came back.

"I can assure you that Bella is fine. No one has been screaming." He had both hands raised in a placating gesture I had seen my father use on the Council many times as I pushed my way past the rest of my Pack and growled only feet from him.

"It's going to attack dad!" Her voice came to me clear as day and I almost felt sick when I realized that her fear that I could feel thrumming through my veins was being caused, not by the vampires that she was surrounded with, but us, and then she was moving through the yard, surrounded by her family, but whole. Her hair a little messy, face a little pale and clearly nervous, but alive and unharmed.

God she was so flawless it hurt!

Looking at her, the afternoon light catching the natural highlights in her hair, the alert chocolate colored eyes scanning the Pack and resting on me ached in a way that was pleasure and pain together. Knowing that she was still human despite the supernatural knowledge I had had only ten minutes before that she had been frightened for her life and had been terrified almost undid me. She was safe and I had never seen anything more beautiful than the pale creamy skinned girl leaning into the overly large vampire's embrace. That was until, her intelligent eyes flashed fire and she went toe to toe with Sam Uley, only making her more perfect, she was courage and fire as well as celestial beauty. There was nothing more in the world that I wanted then her in my arms with that body pressed firmly against mine…

_Gag me! _Embry snorted.

_You're going to give me a boner for the leech lover in a second and you know just how much your sister would love that. _Paul snapped, and was lucky that at that moment Isabella's hand connected hard with Sam's face, it gave me the willpower not to turn and launch myself at Paul. I could feel the extra charge in the air; feel the rage in Sam's chest as he looked down at her petite five foot six inch frame.

One threatening step forward, the look of fear that I could see on her face and feel radiating outward from her chest like it was mine, was all it took, I was between them and then I was human. In that moment he wasn't my Alpha anymore. I knew, that for her, I would step into my birthright long before I was ready if it meant stopping him from harming so much as a hair on her head. Protect, guard, and defend! It was like a set of commands written into my genetic code that, for Isabella Swan, I would obey until my dying breath, no matter what my opponent.

It didn't help that Emily's face was burned to my brain. Perfect proof of what could happen if a werewolf lost control too close to a human. Her lovely face was marred all because of an argument she got into with Sam over Leah. Emily hadn't even slapped Sam the way that Isabella had, perhaps it was because of that one step forward combined with the knowledge I had of the worst that I found I couldn't trust my own Alpha the way that I could only minutes before.

It wasn't until she walked away, arm in arm with the little pixie that I was able to worry about the fact that I was stood naked in the middle of her yard. My head was screaming at me as I shucked on a pair of shorts and turned to follow them. I shuddered, hating myself a little more as Sam settled a hand on my shoulder in understanding and pardon and we, with Leah, followed the Cullens into their house. It was as huge inside as it was outside, the first floor that we were led into was huge and a mostly open plan with a wide central staircase to the left of the front door, a large living room that was separated from the dining area with an L-shaped wall and beyond another L-shaped partition was a huge kitchen that Emily would have died for and would have taken up most of the first floor of my own home. Only problem was the smell, the whole house was saturated in the sweet smell of fermenting, earthy death that made my skin crawl.

There were only two fully enclosed rooms and it was to one of these rooms that we were led. Dr. Cullen opened the door and his wife paused in the doorway before he turned to Isabella and her escort. The pixie had a faraway look on her face and Isabella was frowning at her like she was concerned about something. "Alice?" He asked.

"Bella's going to make breakfast for dinner." Alice grinned at them like she had revealed an important piece of information before hugging Isabella close. "That's such a relief; I thought I'd lost sight of you for good this time." She was grinning as she turned away from her to look at the rest of us. She seemed to concentrate hard as she looked at us and I couldn't stop myself pulling to my full height and glaring down at her as her eyes moved slowly between the three of us standing in front of her. Leah growled softly next to me and Sam stiffened. What did she mean she thought she lost sight of Isabella, what were we missing?

"Alice?" Dr. Cullen said her name like there was much more to the question then just trying to get her attention.

"I'm sorry but I just can't see anything." The happiness she had displayed moments earlier disappearing to be replaced by an expression I could only describe as a pout. She made a noise at the back of her throat and Leah's growl got louder, her body language signaling just how ready she was to phase and stop the little vampire staring at us ever again.

"Leah." There was an edge of warning to Sam's voice.

"I have to take this phone call." Alice turned to Isabella who had taken a step back and away from us the look on her face cautious, the expression on Alice's face flipping quickly again to excitement. "You're just going to love the surprise!" She let a little laugh fall from her lips before skipping away and up the stairs just as a phone somewhere above us started to ring. I looked over at my Alpha, stunned. How had she known that a phone was going to ring or that she needed to be the one to answer it? What crazy fucked up shit was happening in this house where I couldn't do anything to protect my imprint?

"Would you like to join us Bella? It is you they wish to discuss after all." Carlisle asked her. She smiled at him in an effort I was sure to make him feel better; a smile that did little to make her look less worried or take the guard down from her eyes. She loved and relied on the vampire that much was clear, and that level of devotion went a small way in settling the sick feeling in my gut. God, I had this imprinting thing bad.

"I trust you to take care of this dad. I think I'm going to make something to drink and sit this one out." Isabella shook her head and turned to leave. The female vampire that the Coven leader had referred to as his wife cleared her throat lightly and Isabella paused looking embarrassed as she turned back around to look at Sam, Leah and I like she wasn't quite sure how to phrase the question she had been prompted to ask. "Do you guys want some coffee or tea or soda? I mean if you guys drink that kinda thing?" She looked hesitant; every time her eyes fell on Sam she bit the inside of her cheek like she was still waiting for him to jump out of his skin and attack her. I couldn't blame her for wanting to stay away from him. Leah opened her mouth as if to say something and then closed it again with a shake of her head as she shoved shaking hands into her pockets, Sam quirked an eyebrow and we shared a look, he had noticed her fear of him too.

"A coffee would be nice thank you." He said.

"Okay." She nodded and then looked expectantly at me. I must have stared for a moment too long because her brow furrowed. "Anything for you?"

"Coffee sounds nice." I nodded too, ignoring the snort of derision that came out of Leah's nose. "Want a hand?"

She thought about it for a second but finally nodded. "Sure." There was a little hesitance in her voice but she covered it up with a half-smile and beckoned for me to follow her as the others made their way into a room that looked like an office.


	5. Chapter 4

Hello everyone,

Thanks for the reviews for the last chapter go to Grumpy DelSan13, Astilbe, Rose, melodia, Dottyanne, blackenedwolf, Tala Channing, virend and Mandy may, your reviews have all kept me motivated to keep writing. Thank you for the encouragement. I appreciate your thoughts and comments very much so when you're done reading please do type a quick note and hit the review button, getting them in my inbox makes my day and keeps the muse happy.

This story is Beta'd by SeptemberSkies without whom it would rougher than rough and there is a good chance it would also be a lot more confusing. Thank you for your time, effort and words of encouragement!

Lastly, the same disclaimer from the introduction still applies.

Happy reading (and reviewing)

* * *

Chapter 4

(JPOV)

She moved with a studied grace, as if she carefully planned and thought out each move that she was going to make before she made it and I could tell by the way she moved she was conscious of the fact that I was following her. She led me to a kitchen that looked like it was built to cater for an army. Emily would have killed for a kitchen like that to help feed all of the bottomless pits that circled her dining table and yet it was clear that unless Isabella needed food the space went unused, it was almost clinically clean.

She circled around the table sized island in the middle of the kitchen and pulled the kettle off of the stove and filled it with water before placing it on a burner she had just turned on. She reached into the cupboard to her left and fished out three mugs and the makings for coffee and then pulled a teapot and two tins from the same cupboard. She measured out coffee into the two mugs before measuring out loose leaf tea that smelt like raspberries, apple, rosehips, hibiscus and lemongrass into the tea pot. Once she was done she turned slowly and looked at me critically.

"Who are you?" She asked her voice level with none of the rage apparent in it that I had heard out in the garden.

"Jacob Black." I answered her, as I placed my hands in front of me on the island. The contrast between my skin and the white marble countertop was a little shocking and had me stuffing my hands in my shorts pockets before I left a dirty mark on the pristine surface.

"I'm Isabella Swan." She said in return. "I hate when people call me Isabella though. It's too formal."

"Then what do you like to be called?" I asked.

"Bella." It was a piece of personal information that went beyond what was necessary in an introduction and I clung to it like it was a piece of hope.

"Bella it is then." I nodded, careful not to try and push her into speaking more than she wanted to.

"Your dad is William Black?" She was chewing on her lower lip in a way that made me want to vault over the island, take her into my arms and taste those beautiful lips myself but I forced myself to concentrate on her eyes instead while keeping my feet rooted to the tile floor.

"Yep." I popped the 'p' as I nodded but I couldn't help my eyebrows folding together.

"I read about him on the internet." She rushed forward with an explanation. I don't know what it was that she saw on my face but suddenly her face was cherry red, her blush creeping from her cheekbones to her hairline in a way that only served to remind me how real and alive she really was.

"I'm one of his kids. I have twin sisters and a half-brother too." I shrugged offering some personal information of my own in hopes she would begin to see me more as a person and less as a giant monster from a horror film.

"And they're all…" Her voice drifted off like she wasn't sure what word to use.

"Wolves?" I said the word I was sure she was looking for, for her. She nodded; a blush that helped to highlight her cheekbones crept across her face. I shook my head. "No. Just me and my brother."

"But Leah?" She looked uncertain as she scuffed the toe of her sock on the tiled floor.

"An anomaly." I responded. There were women, my own sisters included, in whom the bloodlines ran just as strongly or more strongly and yet they showed none of the telltale signs of the phase. Bottom line, no one knew why Leah had phased.

"Oh." She went back to chewing on her lower lip.

"Where are your biological parents?" I asked.

"They're dead." She looked up at me defiantly, her lower jaw jutting forward like she was preparing for a fight. I couldn't help but remember the way that she had stood up to Sam, the look of righteous indignation on her face as she set him straight on her feelings about the family that she counted as her own.

"I'm sorry." I responded.

"I have a good family Jacob. My parents are good people, I'm close with my siblings and we care deeply for one another. I wouldn't trade them for anything. I think that my biological parents would be glad that I have the family that I do, that I have a mom and dad that love me and care for me." She said quickly, stumbling over her words at times like it was important that she got them out without me interrupting. I didn't and I wouldn't have. I could have stood there in the middle of her kitchen for an eternity to listen to her speak no matter what the topic was or who was around us.

"I lost my mom when I was little. I don't remember hardly anything about her, doesn't mean that there aren't times that I miss her." I shrugged by way of trying to make her understand why I was sorry.

"I'm sorry." She parroted my words back to me and blushed harder when she realized what she had done. "I do miss them I guess but it's more the idea that I miss. I was so young, only three years old when they died, I don't remember them at all. They were from here though. It's part of the reason that Dad thought it would be good to live here for a while, so I could see where I was from and maybe learn a thing or two about my parents, see who it was I would have been if things had been different." The kettle started to whistle behind her and she turned.

"Charlie and Renee Swan?" I asked her.

"What?" She almost spilled the water on the countertop when I spoke instead of in the coffee mug like she was aiming for.

"They were your parents?" I tried again once she had mopped up the water she had spilled and was focusing on the task of pouring the water into mugs again.

"This is one of those small town things that Dad warned me about right? Everyone knows everyone because they grew up together and La Push is so close to the town and with Charlie having been a police officer…" Bella was frowning as she poured the last of the water in the tea pot and covered it with a tartan tea cozy. The guard that had started to drop as we had spoken raised again and I could have kicked myself as I listened to her put the pieces of the puzzle that even she didn't know she was missing together. "They knew each other didn't they, my parents and your parents?"

"Your dad was best friends with my dad before he died. There's a picture of them fishing together in our house. You have your dad's hair and eyes." I responded trying desperately to fix the mistake that I made without trying to sound more like a weirdo. "Dad talks about him sometimes, usually when he's watching sports or going to the cabin to go fishing. I'm sure if you ever wanted to come to the Res and talk to him about Charlie you'd be more than welcome." I picked up a pen that had been left on the island and jotted my cellphone and the house phone number down on a piece of paper that was next to it. She looked at it and then at me, those big doe eyes skeptical as I handed it to her.

"Maybe that's true but I don't think me coming to the reservation is going to be a good idea." She shook her head but took the paper anyway, folding it carefully and putting it in her pocket. "Do you or Mr. Uley take anything in your coffee?"

"One sugar for me, Sam likes his black." I explained and then took the two coffee mugs that she offered me careful not to touch her fingers, afraid that touching her skin would be my undoing and she wasn't close to ready to know the truth of our situation. I smiled, placing the mug with sugar on the island in front of where I had been standing before turning and walking down the hall to the room that Sam had disappeared into.

The window was open, the breeze, I was sure was supposed to somehow make the smell better but it was oppressive. Leah was sitting on a chair as close to the window as she could get and she used my arrival to turn her head toward it and gulp in air, everyone else was looking at me. I handed Sam his coffee.

"How is Bella doing Mr. Black?" Carlisle asked me. I looked at Sam who raised his eyebrows as he took his drink and set it down on the floor next to one of the legs of his chair.

"She's worried." I said trying to breathe shallow breaths when I realized that breathing was going to be hard with the syrupy stench in the air. _Get used to it Black._ A voice that sounded suspiciously like Leah's snapped at the back of my mind. _You imprinted on a girl whose family are vampires. The smell is going to be a permanent fixture in your life._ Fuck! I had spent so much time with Leah in my head it was like she was perpetually stuck there.

"Maybe I should-" The Dr.'s wife stood a fraction of an inch before her husband's hand was on her arm stopping her.

"You need to be here for this conversation. There will be plenty of time for you to talk to Bella when they're gone. Alice is capable of getting to her if she needs help." He said, his voice still tempered and even the way that it had been since we arrived. His wife sat back down but the tension didn't leave her body.

"Have you told her?" Sam asked me, I knew he was talking about the imprint but his expression trying to convey something else to me at the same time.

"No." I shook my head firmly. "She's not ready. She's just worried that we're going to hurt her family." I managed to get the words out but I couldn't help the pain in my chest. I was hurting her, my existence was hurting her and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it but walk on eggshells around her.

"I've told Dr. Cullen about the Connection. That you will be able to feel when she's distressed or hurt like you did this afternoon." Sam said. Leah snorted. His words were clear, as clear as the words that he didn't say and Leah's reaction just backed up my suspicion. He hadn't told them about imprinting, not properly, only the parts that benefited the Pack most. I understood, I really did especially since it was the only way short of kidnapping Bella that Sam could come up with to put his point across and keep my imprint safe but I found that I was pissed off too. My relationship with Bella was not supposed to be a threat and she was already feeling threatened enough by our presence without adding to it.

"I'm not here to make her miserable." I said to the room as a whole as the doctor nodded his head once in affirmation that he had heard and understood me.

(BPOV)

I watched him turn and walk away and I felt a twinge of disappointment until I looked at the coffee that I had made for him left on the island like a silent promise. He would be back and the knowledge made me smile as I put a spoonful of rock sugar in my tea cup and poured the tea over it. I lifted the cup, taking a deep breath of lemon and floral raspberry before sipping, letting the hot liquid slide down the back of my throat and warm me from the inside.

I missed always being warm.

Jacob's father had grown up with my biological father; his family had known mine years before when my parents had lived here in Forks. Had his parents known me as a child? Had I met this Jacob before? Was that why I was comfortable alone in a room with him despite the circumstance that brought him here? Clearly despite their knowledge of vampires, they didn't know the particulars surrounding my parent's deaths and that fact made me a little uncomfortable. They had converged on our home, over a scream that had only happened in a dream, calling me a vampire's pet and belittling the life that I had been happily living and thriving in, what would they do if they knew the truth about my parents, what had really happened the night I became a Cullen.

I knew that we had only just moved, that I hated moving more than the sound of nails against a chalkboard, but the threat to my family and way of life made me feel like it was suddenly a good idea. My stomach flipped and then sank to my feet in reaction to my thought like it caused me physical pain. A tremor ran through my arms down to my fingertips and a voice in the back of my head rebelled at the idea of leaving this place. Since when did I want to stay in wet, cold, miserable Forks?

"You okay?" His voice was a liquid baritone that flowed effortlessly around the space we were in. I turned and looked at him, nodding as I wrapped both hands around the teacup. I shivered as the heat from the tea traveled up my clasped palms anchoring me to the space I was in as it helped to warm me from the outside in.

"Mom said that one of you heard me scream?" I asked, sipping at my tea as I leaned against the counter, glad for the island that separated us. I wanted too badly to reach out and touch him. Feel what his skin actually felt like under my fingertips, was it as smooth as it looked? Would it be warm like my skin or cold like my family's? Was it pliable like mine or hard like marble? I put my teacup down.

"We're kinda pre-programed to react to a human in distress." He shrugged, taking a gulp of his coffee.

"I didn't scream." I said, weaving my fingers together and looked down at the island instead of at him. Breakfast for dinner was sounding better and better, French toast with maple syrup, turkey bacon, strawberries and bananas. Breakfast always helped sort everything out like a chance at starting a day fresh.

"You didn't scream?" His voice sounded strange like he was skeptical. "Why would you say that? Under an hour ago you were terrified, the kind of terrified that only happens when someone thinks they're going to die! What are you afraid of?"

"I didn't scream. I don't have anything to be afraid of! What is your problem?" I snapped, my eyes instantly locking to his. He looked like he was between pissed off and deeply concerned. I was freaked out; a little under an hour ago I had been asleep and dreaming. Asleep and dreaming about a vampire biting me and in my dream I had been terrified and I had been screaming. How could he know that? Did he know that? How was that even possible?

"My problem is that I know that something was wrong!" He voice had risen in volume, not quite enough to equal my outburst of seconds before. His face was fierce, the expression the same on it as when he had run out of the classroom earlier that afternoon.

"I had a dream." I said suddenly, not sure why the words came tumbling out of my mouth or why I felt it was so important to tell him.

"Bella?" Alice's voice drifted down the stairs and into the kitchen.

"I'm fine." I didn't raise my voice to match hers but I knew that I didn't have to for her and every other member of my family to hear me from where they were around the house. More aggression was the last thing that the situation that I was in needed.

"A dream?" He seemed confused.

"You know the kind you have when you're sleeping? You do sleep?" I asked after taking a deep breath and trying to stay calm.

"Yes, I sleep." Jacob looked at me like I had grown a second head.

"Don't look at me like that!" I snapped. "I don't know what the werewolf rules are. Enemies are usually enemies because they are more similar than they like to admit and have a mutual interest in something like land or food or-" He didn't let me finish my thought.

"We DON'T eat people!" He retorted.

"Neither do my family!" I glared at him, and then took another deep breath. I had to get a grip on my temper before I pissed two werewolves off in one afternoon.

"Fine." He said and I watched him struggle for a moment to regain his composure. "So we're here because you had a bad dream?" He still didn't seem to be able to comprehend that idea any more than I was able to.

"This is really frustrating." I did my best to keep my tone level. "Do you…"I started to motion between us and then stopped myself. I took a deep breath instead of finishing the question. "Why did…" I thought better of my next question too. He was frowning as I failed to speak my mind again. I chewed on my lower lip and watched his eyes travel across my face from my eyes to my lips and back again in a way that made a shiver of anticipation run down my spine. "Why does it matter to _you_ how I live my life?"

I watched him struggle with his reply. It was as if I could see the thoughts running through his head as he tried to come up with an explanation. One large hand reached up and ran through the short hair on his head turning it into a spiky mess. "It's complicated," was what he came up with.

"Then explain it to me, after all it is my life that is being debated in that room." I returned.

"Your family has lived here before. They signed a treaty with my ancestors decades ago. It's a complicated document but basically they were given the right to live here at this property, hunt animals on the Olympic Peninsula so long as they respected human life, didn't drink from or turn a human being and stayed off of tribal land." He said carefully and I had a feeling that he wasn't telling me everything. Why would his reaction be so strong over a treaty?

"If we break any parts of the Treaty?" I asked, reaching out and rubbing at the edge of the worktop to keep my hands busy. They were shaking enough that I didn't trust myself to hold my cup, the last thing I needed was to break something and then cut myself on it to add fuel to the fire and considering how my luck was holding out that was what was going to happen.

"You can't break the Treaty Bella." He said softly, his eyes finding mine again and holding them captive. He was telling me the truth and was making sure that I understood it. "You're human. If one of," I could see him physically struggle with the words he was trying to say, "your family," the words looked like they actually hurt him to say, the corners of his eyes pinching slightly, the muscles in his jaw working as his nostrils flared, "break the Treaty then we are within our rights to destroy them on sight."

"Oh." I felt my heart pick up its pace and simple fear settle into my gut in a way that I had never had fear before. I could lose my family to horse sized werewolves if they so much as put a foot in the wrong spot or I got a scratch that I couldn't instantly explain away or I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and needed help that I knew they would risk their lives to give... What would happen to my siblings and I without Esme and Carlisle to balance and keep us secure? Would it be possible to smile again without Emmett pulling pranks or teasing me or Alice not being there to stop me taking life too seriously and Rosalie with the answers when life had to be serious? I wrapped my arms around my torso as premature grief hit me hard.

"Bella." He had moved around the counter and was slowly extending a hand toward my shoulder until his hand cupped the joint and squeezed in what was meant to be a reassuring gesture. I gasped; his hand was hot, beyond fever hot, like the same sort of heat from a cup full of boiling water and the warmth was seeping through my shirt and into my skin. It was like a brand marking me and my body responded never wanting the touch to go away. "So long as the Treaty is respected and you are safe, no one is going to be destroyed. We'll work this thing out; find a way to make it work."

I looked up at him. His gaze was intense; his entire focus was one hundred percent on me and while I knew that I should have been feeling intimidated, I didn't. Jacob Black was a man that protected and for some reason he had chosen to protect me, instead of wanting to turn him away I wanted to relax into what he had to offer. The look on his face spoke of his sincerity, he meant his words and the sick feeling in my gut lessened a little. More than anything, I wanted to believe him.

"Jake!" I almost jumped ten feet in the air and ended up pressed against the counter top my heart beating frantically, one of Jacob's arms wrapped around my waist to steady me. Sam Uley stood looking at us, his eyebrows pulled together and his jaw set in a hard line. The girl he had brought into the house was standing next to him in shorts and a tank top that left none of her curves to the imagination. She was gorgeous and she was smiling at me, a sort of smug grin that made me feel like she was taking pleasure in the fact that I was causing so many problems for everyone. "Time to move out. The Treaty remains intact, the girl stays put."

"You okay?" Jacob looked at me removing his arm as my parents appeared in the open study doorway. Esme looked worried and Carlisle grave, I wondered what had been said to concern them.

"Yeah." I nodded.

"If you need anything call." He said before clenching his jaw and walking toward the others.

"You handle weird better than most." Leah, the female wolf looked me up and down as though she was continuing her assessment of me, long thick eyelashes brushed high cheekbones but the approval on her lips didn't meet her eyes. There was something deeply wrong in her life, her eyes which should have been the color of melted dark chocolate looked dead somehow, like she had forgotten she was supposed to be alive. "You'll survive. See you at school tomorrow." She put her shoulder into Jacob's, making him take a step to the side. They looked at each other and he nodded once to her unasked question. The werewolves turned and left the house with Carlisle following them.


	6. Chapter 5

Hi,

Sorry the update took so long, real life crept up on SeptemberSkies and I, all I can say is that I can't wait for spring break to star next week, I need some serious down time! Thanks for the reviews for the last chapter go to Astilbe, Rose, melodia, Dottyanne, Tala Channing, and Mandy may, your reviews have all kept me motivated to keep writing even when history papers are killing my will to live. Thank you for the encouragement. I appreciate your thoughts and comments very much so when you're done reading please do type a quick note and hit the review button, getting them in my inbox makes my day and keeps the muse happy.

This story is Beta'd by SeptemberSkies without whom it would rougher than rough and there is a good chance it would also be a lot more confusing. Thank you for your time, effort and words of encouragement!

Lastly, the same disclaimer from the introduction still applies.

Happy reading (and reviewing)

* * *

Chapter 5

(BPOV)

I shoved the last of my school books into my bag with a sigh and tugged the zipper closed. The family had been subdued last night; I made dinner, ate it, and then retreated to my room where I did homework until I couldn't focus anymore. I kept thinking about the werewolves. Were they prowling around outside? Would I fall asleep only to find my house under attack the minute that I was defenseless? Jacob had promised me that no one would be hurt if the Treaty remained intact and part of me believed him for reasons that I had no way of explaining or understanding. However, I had seen the way that he had reacted as a wolf toward my father, how quickly they had appeared snarling on our doorstep, and there were so many more of them than there were of us.

"You have to eat something and we have to leave in five minutes." Rosalie's voice floated through my door as she knocked.

"I'm good." I said as she opened it and I slid my feet into a pair of Uggs. She looked at me and raised an eyebrow. "What? I'm allowed to be comfortable," I grumbled and she gave a light laugh.

"Wanna talk about what's put you in flannel, ripped jeans and Uggs?" She stepped into the room even as I stood. I looked down, yes I was wearing a light blue and green flannel shirt over a black t-shirt, there was a small hole in one of my knees that my Ugg boots didn't quite cover and my hair was pulled up into a messy bun at the back of my head. I had opted for comfortable.

"Do you?" I shrugged at her as I pulled on a light jacket.

"The wolves or the boy?" Rosalie persisted.

"I thought we had to leave for school in five minutes?" I shouldered my bag and made for the doorway she stood in.

"Your funeral." She winked but thankfully dropped the inquisition. "How bout we take the jeep this morning?"

"Don't think my truck will survive me?" I asked nodding as she looped an arm through mine and we headed for the stairs.

"How many hours of sleep did you actually get?" She looked critically at me.

"Enough to function." I replied as I reached out and took the toast topped with peanut butter and sliced banana that Esme was holding out for me at the bottom of the stairs. "Thanks, Mom."

"Are you going to be alright going to school?" Esme's thumb brushed the back of my hand. I smiled at her as encouragingly as I could.

"I think it would cause more problems if I didn't go." I said as the rest of my siblings joined us in the hallway and we filed out the door, Alice muttering about my wardrobe choice the whole way to the Jeep.

School was uneventful, I had even managed to convince myself that my only problems were the fact that I couldn't get warm and that the headache that had plagued me the afternoon before was threatening to make a comeback. That was, until second period AP Biology, when I asked Alice for a spare pencil at the wrong moment and got moved next to the werewolf girl. She gave me a look that told me she wished that I had gotten moved anywhere but next to her.

"Today you'll learn how to isolate DNA from onion cells, separating it from other cellular components in a manner that still preserves its structure and sequence. Hopefully by the end of class, you'll have enough DNA to see without the use of a microscope." Mr. Stephenson started handing out the big plastic boxes that contained the materials that we would need to complete our experiment to each pair of students and I looked at Leah skeptically.

"What?" She gave me a look as if just by looking at her I had managed to offend her.

"I didn't realize that we had gotten off on the wrong foot." I said as I pulled out the tubs and beakers we would need for the experiment.

"You live with them and you're a -" It literally looked like she choked on the word that she was trying to say. Her nostrils flared and her jaw clenched as color spread across her cheeks.

"A what?" I asked handing her a couple of beakers and stoppered bottles. She took them, her lips pressed tightly together.

"It doesn't matter. In a nutshell, I don't know what I think or feel about you." She responded, some of the tightness around her neck and jaw disappearing as she mixed a solution of dishwashing detergent and salt.

"What will make you decide?" I asked as I started chopping our onion. She was tall and strong and more of a bitch then Rosalie in need of a good meal. I understood that she didn't like my family but we hadn't hurt anyone and we weren't about to.

"What you do next." She stopped and looked at me, the expression on her face one that was half way between ferial and calculated. We didn't say much for the next thirty minutes, just coexisted as we made the DNA become visible. It was then she stopped and looked at me, her lips pressed together and her jaw working. "I can't tell you what's going on but do yourself and Jacob a favor, don't fight it."

"Fight what?" I asked but she refused to look at me again for the rest of class.

Leah was the first out of class when the bell rang and I was still left wondering what her cryptic phrases meant. Freaking werewolves! I was beginning to think that I should suggest to my family that a change of scenery would be in everyone's best interests, especially after the events the day before. We could go anywhere, Canada maybe or better yet Scotland or Ireland. It had been a dream of mine since I found out about St. Andrews to attend the university there or if not St. Andrews then Glasgow or Oxford. The weather would be perfect for my family and we would be close enough to Europe that I would probably be able to see some of the places that I longed to visit.

Suddenly I felt out of breath and dizzy, like I had run a marathon. My heart was trying to pound its way out of my chest and I felt hot and cold all at once as I stumbled, one arm reaching out, my hand connecting with the lockers as I paused and squeezed my eyes shut as I tried to take deep breathes. Searing heat suddenly wrapped around my waist and pulled me toward a body just as warm. My backpack was swept off my arm as I felt my knees give way just a little but it didn't matter because I was being held up and anchored to that spot in the hallway.

One of my arms reached around his body, my hand taking root in the back of his t-shirt and I held on for dear life. The arm wrapped around me curled my body toward his until my forehead was pressed against his sternum, my other hand pressed against the solid muscles of his stomach. He was here, I wasn't alone. He smelt like the woods, rain and trees, motor oil and spice… His arm tightened and I could feel a light growl start from the pit of his stomach and travel up his chest until it was an audible sound.

"Let her go, dog!" Jasper's hiss cut through the moment. I gulped in another breath filled with his scent and then one more before releasing the death grip I had on his shirt and using my other hand to push gently against his abdomen. His arm loosened as I took a step back and looked at my brother.

"I'm fine Jaz." I moved away from Jacob's arm and shivered, it fell back to his side but he made no move to go anywhere and he was focused on my face. I felt a blush rise from my chest and cover my cheeks. "It was just a dizzy spell. I stumbled; Jacob was making sure I didn't fall." I grabbed my backpack and tossed it as nonchalantly as I could back over my shoulder only to over balance and take an unbalanced step back. One large hand shot out and settled on my hip, fingers applying gentle pressure as he steadied me again. I looked up at him; dark orbs were looking at me out of a face set and serious.

He was beautiful. Dark, expressive eyes peered from long thick lashes that were set above high cheekbones; there was the slightest bump in the bridge of his nose that subtly spoke of a time when it must have been broken, his lower lip was slightly plumper then his upper lip and his jaw was set in a way that pushed his chin forward just a little. His skin was russet and sun kissed, the grip he had on me strong but oddly tender. I should have felt awkward, unnerved even by his proximity but it seemed like the moment he fixed his eyes on me I couldn't quite think straight. The thought itself was enough for me to take a step to the side, just enough for his hand to release me and questions I wasn't in the right place to ask to jump to the forefront of my mind.

"There you guys are! Silly me, I thought you were right behind me!" Alice had decided that an intervention was required. She threw her arms around Jasper's neck and planted a kiss on his cheek, distracting him just long enough to relieve some of the tension in the air. "We haven't properly met yet, I'm Alice." Alice extended one of her tiny hands to him. I looked between it and him and blinked as I raised an eyebrow at her. He seemed taken aback, and tension ran quickly through his shoulders and neck, but he extended his right hand to her, engulfing her tiny hand in his for just long enough to be seen as polite.

"Jacob." He nodded once, bringing his hand back and clenching it at his side like he wasn't sure what to do next. Neither did I, I felt like I had just walked into an episode of the twilight zone. Yesterday everyone wanted to rip each other's heads off and today they were shaking hands, what was Alice up to? "You okay?" Jaob was focused on me again.

"Didn't eat a proper breakfast, just a little dizzy, I'm honestly fine now." I affirmed and I was, only I had a nagging feeling that it was due to the instant calming effect his presence appeared to have on me once again. Maybe, like my family, werewolves had their own set of special talents and abilities; maybe Jacob was an empath like Jasper. "We have Math right Jaz?" It took actual effort for me to drag my eyes away from Jacob. Jasper nodded, Alice grinned and I looked at Jacob once more before nodding myself and moving in the direction I needed to go to make it to class.

"See you at lunch, Bella." Jacob said, his voice sending a small shiver down my spine as I looked back over my shoulder at him and smiled softly.

"Yeah." I nodded as I looped an arm through my sister's and let my siblings lead me away with even more unanswered questions and an uneasy feeling in my gut.

(JPOV)

Patience.

It had quickly become my motto, it wasn't easy but it was what she needed. Sam and Dr. Cullen had been clear with each other. Bella was Switzerland - neutral territory. We were reassured she had never wanted to become one of them; she had much more human goals and aspirations for her life. Sam had informed them that there was a connection between her and I. He had told them that connections like it happened sometimes between wolves and humans but he hadn't uttered the word Imprint and he hadn't explained it properly, instead he used it as a threat; we would know if she so much as felt worried. They had agreed that she would not be stopped from getting to know us if it was what she wanted and they knew that we would be watching closely but the coven leader also made it perfectly clear that if she was endangered or they felt she was threatened while on Quileute land that the Treaty would be null and void and they would act accordingly.

The first couple of days were sheer torture. At school I kept a careful eye on her and when I was at the res school I had to trust that Leah was doing it for me. I saw how she interacted with her leeches, how they protected and cared for her. I saw the way that Leah's cold exterior frustrated her, I saw the desire in her to take up the cheerful but shy Angela Webber on her offer of friendship but I could also see the hesitation that stopped her from offering too much of herself.

I hadn't touched her since that first day back at school when I felt her concern take a physical toll on her body but I remembered what it felt like when she had turned her five foot six frame into mine when I had caught her. I remembered the weight of her body in my arm as her knees had stopped cooperating when she needed them to hold her up, what it felt like when she pressed her forehead against my chest and her muscles had all relaxed against me. I remembered the strawberries and spiced vanilla that drifted from her hair, all but obscuring the scent of vampire that lingered around her. For a millisecond my world had stopped and the only thing that existed in it was her and letting her walk away had been almost painful.

I lived on those memories.

Her eyes had sought me out at lunch, a slow smile turning up the corners of her mouth as she found me and before she was bustled off by the pixie to the lunch line. Just before she sat down at a table next to Angela she had smiled at me again and part of me felt like I was about to combust inside.

Life fell into a routine after that. I went to school at the res except for the days when I had AP Chem or AP English. Leah and I ate in silence at the same table in the cafeteria, Bella would cast glances at me from the table she sat at either with her family or her classmates who she was trying to connect with. We barely spoke ten words to each other but every now and then I would let my eyes drift across the cafeteria or the class room as if to reassure myself of her presence, sometimes I would even catch her looking at me. I would get home, do my homework and then pull as many hours as I could as close to her house as we were allowed before it was time to fulfill my prerequisite of five hours sleep before the whole thing started again.

"Imprinting is a sick business." Leah said as she dropped her lunch on the table and looked at me. I shrugged, I couldn't say that I didn't agree with her, I'd never felt so out of control in my life. "What are you going to do about it?" It was Friday and I had chosen to arrive for the afternoon early instead of sit around the cafeteria at the res school where I knew Bella Swan most definitely wasn't. Knowing she was nearby somehow made it easier to breathe.

"Nothing." I responded. "I won't force her into this, Leah."

"Should have told that to your DNA before it did." There was her characteristic layer of contempt. Nothing could just be nice or sympathetic in the land of Leah Clearwater, there always had to be a flip side, an edge.

"Invite her to the bonfire." She challenged me, both eyebrows raised, her eyes glued to mine. I gritted my teeth and glared at her.

"Yeah, cause that's a good idea." I shook my head, casting a glance to the door way. She still hadn't made it to the cafeteria. She was fine; if something was wrong I would know about it. Her emotions seemed to live in my chest; well at least the extreme ones and the pull that I had started to associate with her were content and quiet. God, it felt longer than the twenty-six hours and fourteen minutes since the last time she was in my sight.

"Your dad and Sam are right Jake, she needs to see us as people. How's she going to do that from across a cafeteria?" The grimace on her face told me how much she hated agreeing with anything that Sam had to say, even if he was right.

"And you think a bonfire is the way to go? With eleven wolves and the elders and their imprints looking at her like she's a freak of nature?" I gave her a look clearly meant to express how stupid I thought her idea was before my eyes snapped back to the cafeteria door.

"If you don't, I will." She looked over her shoulder as she followed the line between my eyes and the door. "All of this angsty, Victorian, gazing longingly at each other from across a room shit, has to stop. Like, now before I gag!" She was shaking her head as she opened her lunch and pulled out a sandwich and a bottle of water.

"I'll kill you!"

The doors swung open and she walked into the room. She had tied her long hair into a ponytail but a few pieces had escaped the binder and caressed her face and neck. She was laughing at something that the largest of the vampires, Emmett, I think he was called, was saying. As soon as she was in the door, her eyes swept the room until they found me. A soft smile lifted the corners of her mouth and I watch the tension in her shoulders disappear. I offered her a smile in return. For now knowing that she was aware of my presence was enough.

"You couldn't concentrate long enough to kill me even if you wanted to." Leah was coughing back a laugh. I focused on her long enough to throw a Frito at her. She caught it and popped it into her mouth with another roll of her eyes.

"No one asked you to be a bitch, Leah." I growled.

"No one asked you for your opinion." She snapped back before, turning and looking at the girl who was suddenly only a few more steps from our table.

Bella Swan was nervous. She was raking her lower lip through her teeth, her eyes kept flickering between me and Leah and she was gripping her lunch tray like it was bound to try and run away from her. She was also alone in her approach, her siblings sitting at a table across the hall all watching carefully without moving to intervene.

"Hi." She exhaled as she came to a stop, she looked quickly at me and then Leah and then back at me again. I blinked, she was a goddess in a human's body, the blush that was rising to her cheeks was the perfect shade of crimson, I could get lost in the perfectly shaped pools of chocolate she had for eyes.

"Hi." I smiled at her, sliding up the bench a little and indicating with a hand that she could join us if she wanted, all the while trying not to appear desperate. In truth there was nothing more that I wanted in the world at that moment than for her to sit down next to me and smile at me again. She took a deep breath and did just that as she let it out through a small part in her lips. The blush on her face only intensified when her knee bumped my thigh and I didn't move my leg away from the accidental contact, despite the flush on her cheeks she didn't move away from me either. "Settling in okay?" I asked.

"It's different than what I'm used to." She shrugged. "You weren't at lunch yesterday."

"I only take AP classes here. The reservation has its own school." I was surprised that I wasn't physically glowing after her statement. She was noticing my comings and goings just as much as I was aware of hers.

"But you're here all the time." She directed at Leah.

"I'm on babysitting duty." Leah shook her head scornfully.

"Oh." Her lips formed the shape of the word and I kicked Leah none too gently under the table. She ignored me and devoured the remainder of her sandwich in three bites.

"Got plans for your weekend?" Leah asked casually a moment later.

"No. Just homework." Bella looked at me and I realized that I was staring at her. I pulled my eyes away from her face and over to Leah with an expression that was clearly meant to state that if she continued in the vein she was going I was going to deliver on my promise.

"There's a big bonfire tonight, you should come." The words were out of her mouth before there was any chance of stopping her. Leah wasn't one to be intimidated by any of us, no matter how much larger than her we were, she was always faster.

"You want me to come?" She was looking at Leah in disbelief and then she looked back at me, her knee pressing a little more firmly into the side of my leg. I took a breath trying not to concentrate on that one small area of contact that made my heart beat just that little bit faster.

"It's a mostly just the Pack and their families, some of the older folks from the res, there's a bit of a cook out, my dad tells the old tribal stories and legends. Our loved ones have a big secret they carry around with them all the time; it helps to get together and lets us feel almost normal for a while." I explained quickly, doing my best to take as much pressure as possible off of her. "You are more than welcome but it's nothing fancy."

"You're going?" I could see her thinking, weighing out the pros and cons of going or not going. I nodded. "Leah too?" I nodded again. "But my family can't come onto your land."

"No." Leah was firm and a little sharp; Bella turned and frowned at her, her nostrils flaring slightly. Any of Leah's famously derogatory statements had the potential to spark a fight that could land us all in trouble. They just looked coolly at each other and then the tension seemed to dissipate.

"How do I know then, if I come, that you won't stop me from going home when it's over?" She asked.

"That would make us in violation of the Treaty." Leah said at the same time as I spoke.

"Because you have my word." Leah and I glared at each other and a small jingle of a laugh escaped from the angel to my left. I looked at her, knowing the look on my face was probably a strange combination of shock and bliss. I could listen to that sound all day, even more so if I was the one that brought it out of her mouth.

"Hey, Bella!" Emmett called her from across the room. He put an arm in the air and waved for her to come over. She waved back to him and nodded, gathering her tray and looking at me.

"I'll think about it." She offered me a smile that lit up her whole face before heading back to the table her family was sitting at.

"_You have my word._" Leah made a face and batted her eyelids as she mimicked me and snorted. "You fucking imprint people." She gathered up the remains of her lunch and headed outside before I could reach over the tabled and give her a good shake. Favor or no favor she was starting to grate on my last nerve.


	7. Chapter 6

Hi,

Sorry the update took so long, I had exams and the last two essays of the year to hand in but now I'm on holiday and could get back to the writing bug so here you go! Thanks for the reviews for the last chapter go to The all mighty powerfulM, vriend, Grumpy DelSan 13 Astilbe, Rose, melodia, Dottyanne, and Mandy may, your reviews have all kept me motivated to keep writing even when I know I should be studying. Thank you for the encouragement. I appreciate your thoughts and comments very much so when you're done reading please do type a quick note and hit the review button, getting them in my inbox makes my day and keeps the muse happy.

This story is Beta'd by SeptemberSkies without whom it would rougher than rough and there is a good chance it would also be a lot more confusing. Thank you for your time, effort and words of encouragement!

Lastly, the same disclaimer from the introduction still applies.

Happy reading (and reviewing)

Chapter 6

(BPOV)

"You've been quiet." Alice said as she watched me stuff the books from my locker into my bag. I knew I'd been quiet but I didn't know how to talk to her about what was going through my head. I'd had plenty of time to think over the last few days and the conclusions I kept coming to made me feel like I was going crazy. Maybe I was, but it was those conclusions that made me go speak with Jacob at lunch and those same conclusions that made me want to go to the bonfire just to please him even though the idea of being alone and surrounded by so many wolves scared me half to death.

There was more to the whole protection thing than he had explained. He had heard a scream that had only happened in a dream, he always seemed to appear when I got emotional or worried, I seemed to have an almost perpetual headache or felt a cold that I couldn't seem to shake unless he was nearby and I always knew when he was. I felt a current I couldn't explain away as static electricity when my knee touched his leg and that contact had settled the nerves that had been building on my way over to the table but I hadn't expected an invitation to a Pack function nor a desire to attend.

"I have a lot on my mind." I responded, feeling Jacob's eyes on me as he walked past, Leah frowning beside him. Alice followed my gaze as my eyes trailed after his retreating form and smiled as she shook her head.

"Anything to do with a six foot five werewolf?" She asked as I closed my locker door. I sighed and slumped against it.

"Would you accept no as an answer?" I asked.

"I think I know you better than that." She tutted at me, frowning to herself for a moment as she concentrated on the direction Jacob had gone in.

"They invited me to a bonfire on the reservation tonight. It'll mostly be the wolves I guess, and the council, but Jacob said his dad, Billy, will be there and he was friends with the Swans." I shrugged and shouldered my bag, scuffing the toe of my Chucks off the linoleum floor.

"You want to go." She stated, her tone too neutral to be comforting, and I felt myself cringe. It felt like I was betraying my family if I admitted that I did, but I wasn't good at lying at the best of times.

"I did." I said carefully.

"But?" Truths without proper explanation had never been good enough for my sister.

"My family isn't welcome and they are all strangers even if they did know the Swans. It's not like you guys are exactly fans of each other either and I don't want it to seem like I'm not completely committed to _my_ family." I explained as I pushed off the lockers and we started down the hallway.

"We know you love us Bella, you don't have to prove that by not making other friends, even if they aren't the most pleasant smelling of friends." My sister wrapped an arm around my waist and leaned her head against my shoulder, still smiling at me.

"What?" I asked, not understanding what she meant.

"Never mind. Would you go if you didn't have to go alone?" She asked.

"Probably. If Mom and Dad don't mind." I affirmed, laughing. "It's hard to find people who do well with our brand of weird. It's even harder when their brand of weird doesn't mix with our brand of weird." I paused as I looked up and saw Jacob watching us from the doorway. "Hi." I breathed, feeling the beginning of another awkward conversation coming on as he looked at Alice, the lines around his eyes tightening slightly but his reactions were getting less severe, at least outwardly.

"Hi." He replied. I couldn't help the smile that crossed my lips as his eyes traced my face any more than the heat that rose to my cheeks.

"Can she bring a friend?" Alice's voice said from next to me almost startling me out of the reverie that I seemed to fall into every time those dark eyes looked at me so intently.

"The population of Forks doesn't know any more about us then they do about you." Jacob said carefully before looking at me again. "I just wanted to let you know that there is absolutely no pressure Bella, Leah is rash and impulsive and there will be other opportunities to meet old friends of your father's when there aren't a Pack of crazy guys running around."

"What if her friend already knew about us and was well acquainted with weird?" Alice asked again before I was able to answer him and turn down the invitation using the out he was graciously giving me.

"Alice!" I hissed at her. "There is no one in a thousand mile radius that's human and fits that bill."

"Can you just let the mutt answer?" She pursed her lips and gave me a pointed look. My mouth snapped shut with a click of my teeth but I didn't stop glaring at her. "Well?" She turned back to him and he looked confused, eyebrows pulled together as he watched our exchange.

"Well, I guess that would probably be fine." He said searching my face like I could give him answers to questions that I didn't have the answers for. Alice clapped her hands together, laughing and making me jump.

"She'll be there. Just after dark right?" Her tawny eyes were sparkling as she spun me around in a circle. "Can I have your truck keys?"

"Alice?" I looked at her absolutely bewildered as I fished them out of my pocket but didn't hand them over to her.

"You can tell me how much you love me later. For now, Zachery's waiting for you outside and I'm sure that with a little persuasion you won't have to go to the bonfire alone." I threw my arms around her neck and hugged her tightly, depositing my keys in her hand with a grin before impulsively hugging Jacob too. He was a warm mass of muscle that seemed to instinctively mold around me until I twirled away from him. "I'll see you tonight." I beamed at him and then flew out the door and down the stairs into the parking lot.

Sure enough as promised, Zachery Stuart was leaning up against his black Ford Explorer with a wide grin on his deeply tanned face. Emerald green eyes took me in from under an untidy mop of mahogany brown hair that threatened to fall into them at any moment. He was a lanky twenty-one year old who looked like he had been trying too hard to become a dark haired version of David Beckham. He stood tall just in time to catch me when I launched myself at him, his arms wrapping around my middle as he swung me in a wide circle before setting me down on my feet.

"Bella!" He exclaimed laughing loudly.

"I thought you were going to Burning Man." I tried to glare at him but I couldn't help smiling. "I haven't heard from you for two months and haven't seen you in six. I was starting to think you were gone forever!" I chided him with a weak slap to his shoulder.

"I got a better offer than setting up camp on the Playa." He pulled my bag from my shoulder and in the process tugged me close enough to wrap an arm around me and hug me again. "I got myself front row tickets to Bella's journey of self-discovery and Carlisle helped me get into U Dub." He opened the back door of his SUV and deposited my bag inside before opening the passenger side with a flourish.

"But you were going to go to UCLA." I raised my eyebrows at him.

"Yeah well, it was strongly hinted to me by a certain little clairvoyant that I was needed more here." He said seriously. "Come to the beach with me."

"I-" I couldn't help my hesitation. The closest beach was on Quileute territory and suddenly I found that I was nervous.

"Hesitance?" He looked around us and then paused. "Doesn't have anything to do with a rather large and pissed off looking teenage boy glaring at us from the school steps does it?" I instantly turned my head, my smile disappearing and worry creeping up through my stomach as I found Jacob's form. He was looking at us, watching the interaction between Zach and I closely but I was sure the expression on his face wasn't one of anger but instead of hurt, the kind of hurt that tried to push the air out of your lungs and wouldn't let it back in. We looked at each other for a long moment as I absorbed the emotion I could see until Zach's hand on my shoulder brought me out of my contemplation. I lifted a hand, my lips curling up into a smile that I hoped would ease some of the hurt that was written all over Jacob's face but instead of a smile in return his expression went completely blank. I took a deep breath and turned back to Zach.

"The beach is kinda his territory." I explained.

"Territory? What have you gotten yourself mixed up in that you can't go to the beach?" He looked at me and then looked up over my head at where I knew Jacob must still be standing, a frown on his face.

"No, _I_ can go to the beach_ you _can go to the beach it's the rest of the family." I gave him a little push to pull his attention away from Jacob and slid into the passenger seat. He shut the door and hurried to the driver's seat.

"He knows about the family?" I just nodded in response as he started the car. "You have a lot of explaining to do, Darlin'." He shook his head as we headed out of the parking lot and started the drive to the beach.

First beach was quiet but then, unlike the summer months when it was reportedly packed with the local population, it was cool and overcast. There was a gentle breeze that made me want to pull the light jacket I had a little tighter around my body and the ocean looked less than inviting. I shivered a little and took a deep breath as my stupid headache throbbed in response to the wind hitting my face. Zach must have noticed because an arm reached around my shoulders and tugged me closer to his body as we walked down the path that would take us onto the sand.

"I know you needed a break from all the vampire crap, but I really hated it when you went totally MIA on me." I said as I played with the zipper on his jacket pocket.

"I'm sorry." He said simply. "What's going on here? Alice seemed to think that me being nearby was important for your sanity."

"I can't tell you everything. You know how supernatural circles work, but it seems that Dad moved us right into a supernatural epicenter." I shook my head.

"And?" Zach gave me a scrutinizing look.

"And there is this guy…" I felt my face heat up incriminatingly and I groaned inwardly. There were times I really hated my body's default blush setting.

"The one that looked like he wanted to eviscerate me?" There was a seriousness laced in the teasing tone he was using.

"His name is Jacob and I think evisceration might be taking it a little far, after all you are human. His people hate my family, they protect humans from vampires and he took one look at me and decided that I was his to protect." I chewed on the inside of my lip for a moment.

"His?" There was no more teasing just seriousness.

"Yeah, but it's more complicated than that, I think, Zach but you're going to think I'm insane."

"More then I already do?" He winked, making a real effort to keep things light and me talking. I pinched his side making him jump a half step away from me before shooting him a glare that I hoped conveyed how serious this situation really was. "Okay, okay, okay." He put his hands up in surrender. "Hit me with the insane."

"I have absolutely no evidence that makes any sense but I always seem to know where he is and he appears the minute my emotions get the better of me. I had this nightmare and he showed up with half a dozen of his buddies claiming that he had heard me scream but I hadn't screamed except for in the stupid dream and I get these headaches all the time when he isn't around and when he is they miraculously seem to disappear but I don't know if any of it is because of him. I mean, he's cute and smells good and pays me attention and the only reason he is probably even paying me any attention is because he feels he has to protect me from my family and my bio-parents were all tight with his dad and other members of his tribe and..." It seemed like the minute I started talking about all the jumbled up thoughts in my head they just came spilling out of my mouth like verbal vomit.

"Woah there." Zach cut me off, pulling me around to face him where we stood in the middle of the beach. "Like a physical connection?"

"I dunno, it's like a piece of string that connects me directly to him and hurts when it's stretched too tight and makes me so aware of him, like I sort of know where he is, I-I can't explain it properly." I looked down at my feet.

"You're like a magnet for supernatural shit." He took a deep breath, I could tell by the tone of voice that he was trying to be rational. "Have you asked him about it?"

"No." I shook head. "It's hard to feel that it's okay to get to know him or anyone else when they are so hostile toward my family. He did invite me to a bonfire they are having tonight though, maybe we can talk to him about it there."

"We?" He didn't sound like he was impressed with the word.

"Go with me Zach?" I smiled at him sheepishly.

"Damn it Bella, I left because I wanted a break from the vampire scene, now you're dropping me in the middle of more supernatural shit." He sighed and I knew that I had him on the fence. Zach's indoctrination into the supernatural had been violent and destructive and as much as we had each other's backs since the pressure had been too much and here I was asking him to get back in up to his neck.

"Zach," I looked up and gave him as close as I could to Alice's perfectly perfected puppy dog eyes. He just raised an eyebrow and sighed in a way that was much too theatric. I had him! "Please?"

"Do I at least get to know what kind of creature I'm dealing with this time?" He asked. I shook my head and he shook his in return as he threw an arm around my shoulder again. "God, you owe me one."

"More than you know." I agreed but couldn't stop the smile. Today was a good day, Zach was here to visit and I was going to get some answers.

(JPOV)

_Jesus, what's up your ass? _Leah was snippy.

_Back off Leah!_ I snapped at her. I wanted to go and explain to Sam that _my_ imprint was bringing some human male that was in on the Cullen secret to one of the bonfires and why so that it was over and done with.

_Here I thought you'd be in a better mood and thanking me for my intervention. _She just wouldn't let up so instead I threw the memories of my conversation with Bella and the Pixie at her and then with a bitterness and jealousy that I didn't like the taste of I let her see through my eyes what it was like when she ran into the arms of another man.

_Damn, she knows how to pick men._ It was not the comment that I needed from Leah and it didn't help when she started closely examining the memory. She appreciated the way he dressed that accentuated his broad shoulders that tapered down to a narrow waist and hips, apparently he had beautiful eyes that were only helped by his dark hair and naturally olive skin and as far as Leah was concerned the tattoos she was sure she saw peeking out from the ends of the jacket he was wearing over his t-shirt added to the appeal. I lunged to the side, my teeth snapping on air but she stumbled as she laughed at me.

_Serves you right. _I said satisfied with karma's dealings.

_You're an idiot Black. You seem to forget she's _your_ imprint, there is no way she's in love with anyone else, it doesn't work that way for the imprintee. _She bumped my hip with her shoulder before cutting behind me and veering slightly in a new direction that would have us taking a track toward First Beach. _Stop being a sulky bastard and come on._

After a moment's deliberation I gave in with a sigh. Leah was right, I wasn't going to have a moment's peace in my own head until I had seen her, and with her on Quileute land there wasn't a better opportunity. None of the imprints had been in a current relationship before the imprint; they had no physical or emotional attachments that had rendered the imprint moot, why would Bella be any different? But then, what as of yet was normal about our imprint?

She wasn't Quileute, she wasn't even Native American, not that it mattered to me but the 'Council members were already grumbling to my father about it and they hadn't even met her yet. Despite having been born in Forks, she hadn't lived here since she was a child and she had no personal ties with the tribe, top that off with the fact she was living with vampires, considered them as much family as the human parents that had given her life, made my situation unlike anything the other imprinted wolves had gone through.

_Could you get any more angsty? Grow a set and start acting like a man. _Leah snapped. _You want her, go fucking do something about it._

_Got your imprint on Quileute land? _Quil's voice was a little too enthusiastic.

_With another man, now he's all paranoid and bitchy. _Leah extrapolated. I snapped at her heels, she just laughed at me and kept easily out of the way of my teeth. Quil barked back his own laughter as he headed in our direction to join us and Tristan and Nathan's presences disappeared from the Pack mind.

_Can't believe Sam let you and the twins patrol together, that's like leaving the goon squad in charge. _I barked. I fucking hated the Pack mind and having so many others in my head made me even more pissed off.

_Fiercest goon squad on the planet. _Quil's mind was full of laughter. His laughter died away when we reached a spot where the trees gave a perfect view of the beach.

There was my Bella, throwing rocks into the surf as she talked animatedly with her male companion. She had tied her hair into a messy knot on the top of her head and while she looked happier than I had ever seen her in a while, she looked cold and tired somehow. She stopped mid-sentence, her body stiffening as her head turned and her eyes started searching the tree line.

_God she's boring._ Leah laid down and rested her head on her front legs, her eyes closing just enough to make it look like she wasn't watching me. I shot her a look she ignored with an inner eye roll before focusing my own superior hearing, courtesy of my wolf, on the pair.

"What?" Zachery gave her a strange look as Quil appeared next to Leah and I. Unlike Leah who was entirely too relaxed, he was prepared to interfere if I decided to actually follow the instinct that was urging me to get rid of the competition by any means necessary.

"I think he's here." She replied; her eyes coming to rest in my direction

"You're starting to make me think you really are crazy." He said but he was frowning, the look on his face saying that he was taking her far more seriously than his words implied as he cast his eyes over her head in the same direction that she was focusing on.

"I told you, none of it makes sense. You're the one who always said that the supernatural can take its toll on you. You only lasted two years before you disappeared; I've been in the middle of it almost all my life, maybe I've finally cracked." There was a touch of genuine pain in her voice and she looked miserable.

"We can always find out…" He took a step or two toward where the three of us were observing them. "Come out, come out wherever you are," he called, a mischievous expression on his face that I didn't like much. She did not look impressed.

_You wanted to know if anything was going on between them, now's your chance. _Leah gave me a mental nudged from where she was laying without bothering to open her eyes and actually look at me, but I didn't move, I just stood there looking at them.

"Helloooooo! Anybody out there?" He called again, laughter in his voice.

"Stop, you're just being stupid." I watched her sigh and then tug on his arm as she turned away from the spot where we were and tried to get him to walk away with her.

"Okay, I give. Maybe you have cracked." He shrugged the look on his face still playful but I didn't like his words. I tensed, all the muscles in my body honed in on my target. I didn't like that Bella thought she was going crazy but for him to say those words to her was out of the question.

"Probably." She shrugged again and he frowned suddenly as he reached out, a hand cupping her shoulder as she wrapped her arms around her middle and pulling her off balance so that her other shoulder collided with his ribcage.

"Maybe I should turn down U Dub and head down to UCLA as per the original plan, take you with me. Carlisle offered to let you go with me six months ago, I'm sure he'll let you now, you can get away from the crazy for a while. The real world is very different from the one you're used to living in."

My heart skipped a beat in my chest and suddenly I felt sick. What if she wanted to go away with him? Somewhere like California would be safe for her, her family wouldn't be able to live there or any other vampires for that matter, it was too sunny.

_You seriously going to do nothing?_ Leah was scornful.

_If it was my girl I would have a thing or two to say about someone taking her anywhere. _Quil offered his two cents.

_Especially someone that good looking._ Leah added through a yawn and I gritted my teeth ignoring them.

I couldn't take it anymore, not the mental goading from Leah or the apparently very close friend of Bella's trying to take her away; I phased and reached for the shorts I had tied around my ankle. I carefully calculated the distance between me and her, eight, ten, maybe a dozen strides at most would be all it would take for me to cover the space between us. Less than fifteen seconds and I could have her in my arms safely away from the man that was causing a bubble of stress in her chest. I took a step forward before my focus was yanked out of my own mind.

"No!" It was an exclamation that burst from her lips, her eyes got wide and I felt a flutter of panic that I had felt from her before but in her own kitchen and in the halls of Forks High. Was the thought of leaving always the reason? Had she contemplated it before? Did she want to leave? I knew that it wasn't that simple anymore, I had to think about what was right for her, my desires and happiness seemed to pale in comparison to her's, and if California would make her happy then she should be in California.

"You might like it. It's sunny and warm most of the time." He was starting to guide her away, back toward the main parking area near the beach.

"All I ever wanted was to be able to have my family and the sun and heat and now I suddenly can't stand the idea of leaving cold, rainy Forks. I guess I am crazy, this just proves it." She had stopped and leveled with him. I pressed the palm of my hand into the trunk of the tree closest to me and ordered my feet not to move. My muscle trembled, my body and mind at war with each other yet again. Isabella Swan might be my imprint but she didn't know that and I hadn't earned the right yet to interfere in her personal life.

"I was only joking about the crazy, you brought it up, I didn't think you actually believed you could be." He looked bewildered as he tugged her forward and she fell into step beside him.

"Then what is wrong with me Zach?" She cried.

"Nothing." He replied sincerely. "Unless you count not wanting to live where it's hot and sunny. We all change as we grow up, stop wanting some things and find that we want things we never wanted before. It's part of the human experience. " The corner of her mouth twitched and the panic slowly dissipated as I leaned up against the nearest tree watching her walk away with him.

"I missed you Zach." She said.

"Missed you too kid." He replied softly and I turned away from them. Quil growled softly as he looked at me and Leah snorted as she stood up and shook lightly.

"Don't look at me like that, it's complicated." I said, not bothering to phase again as I started walking away from the shore and in the direction that would eventually take us to Sam and Emily's place. I still had to break it to Sam that I had agreed to Bella bringing an outsider to one of the bonfires.

It didn't take us long to get to Emily's cottage, Leah stopped before she stepped out of the woods, her ears laid back against her skull and her body tense. I understood, she didn't go to Emily's house, not even when she first phased had she step onto the property and she wasn't about to now. She sniffed suddenly and growled. I looked through the kitchen window and saw her brother, Seth hovering near the kitchen door. Quil bumped my leg with his tail in his own version of farewell before turned back to the forest and patrol.

"I'll get him Leah." I said touching her shoulder before walking through Emily's yard, up the porch steps and into the kitchen.

"Jake." Seth greeted me with a smile as he stuffed the last mouthful of a muffin in his mouth. I put my hand on his shoulder and squeezed hard. He grimaced.

"Your sister is waiting for you outside." I indicated with my head that he should get moving sooner rather than later.

"I was just saying hi Jake." He sounded torn and my heart went out to Emily a little as a sad sigh escaped her lips.

"You don't have to justify it to me Seth, you do however know the agreement that was made when you phased. You're not supposed to be here unless you're on Pack business." I ruffled his hair with a soft smile. "Go." He looked quickly over at his cousin before nodding to me and heading out of the door. "Hey Em." I turned and smiled at Sam's imprint, her face was red and her eyes glassy and it was my turn to give a sad sigh.

"Jake." She sounded choked. "I lost my family because of this too you know." Her voice was soft as I walked to the breakfast bar she was stood behind and placed my hand over the one she had resting on the countertop and squeezed it lightly.

"She lost her lover, her best friend, her father and her future; add insult to injury she has to share a mind with Sam while she puts her life on the line daily. Let her keep her family Em." I said softly. There was so much pain and suffering all because of a cruel trick of genetics. Leah was hurting but she wasn't the only one that had been hurt in the situation. Emily had lost an extended family she had been close to, she had been hurt and had to be relocated, her future was now tied, like the rest of us, to a strip of land barely two miles squared and the territory that surrounded it. We had all lost a lot, wolves and imprints, when vampires started trolling the area again, and we were still losing. I released her hand as Sam walked through the back door. She gave her fiancé a sad smile before leaving us alone in the kitchen. "Sam." I nodded.

"Everything okay Jake?" Sam was frowning as he looked in the direction that Emily had gone before pouring himself a cup of coffee.

"If you mean Emily, Seth was here when I got here. Leah saw him, so don't expect Sue to ignore it this time." I explained the scene he had walked into.

"I'll take care of it." He nodded with a sigh. "What brings you around? Bella okay?"

"Except that she's starting to think she's going insane, she's fine. Leah invited her to the bonfire tonight." I said.

"She agreed to come?" He looked shocked and I couldn't blame him.

"With a friend." I grimaced.

"Vampires can't come to La Push!" He barked, glaring at me.

"Not a vampire, come on Sam, she's not that stupid and neither am I!" I snapped back at him. "He's a human. He knows about the Cullens. They seem... close." The word tasted bad in my mouth.

"This is a Pack thing Jacob." Sam was pissed.

"She is Pack and she needs to get to know us Sam, you've said so yourself and there is no way she's going to feel comfortable coming to the res alone knowing we're purposed to kill her family and others like them. She's been orphaned once; you think she wants that again?" I glared at him. Since the imprint things had changed between Sam and me, he was no longer as much of a mentor that I looked up to and had become more of an annoyance; we had ceased agreeing on more than either of us cared to admit. Something was going to have to give and I was sure that this time, it wasn't going to be me.


End file.
